Cobb County leaders unveiled a five-year economic development plan on Thursday designed to spur job growth and incomes while reducing unemployment and poverty.
But paying for the initiative could be a challenge and some community members are already opposed to using county money to fund the project.
Cobb’s Competitive EDGE (Economic Development for a Growing Economy) plan, intended as a holistic approach to boosting the county’s economy and communities, is expected to cost $1 million to implement each of its five years. To pay for it, officials are proposing creating a separate 501(c)(3) entity to solicit public and private dollars from the chamber, local businesses and possibly the county, school systems and cities. EDGE operations and staff would likely be housed at, but not part of, the Cobb Chamber.
County leaders involved in EDGE's steering committee were frustrated, said consultant Mac Hollady, whose firm Market Street Services developed the initiative.
“They know that the county really has not progressed the way it should have in job creation,” he said.
Since the recession began in 2007, Cobb has lost about 35,000 jobs, dropping the county’s workforce to 1998 levels.
Despite the initiative's job-creation goals, it should not be funded by taxpayers during a bad economy, said Lance Lamberton, president of the Cobb Taxpayers Association.
“We’re constantly having budget issues," Lamberton said. “If it’s such a great thing, they need to raise private capital.”
Cobb’s EDGE plan is similar to Gwinnett County’s Partnership Gwinnett economic development plan, also developed by Market Street Services. Unlike the Cobb proposal, the Gwinnett initiative is operated as a branch of the county’s chamber to save money
There was never a concern with the county investing in the project, said a Partnership Gwinnett official, who suggested that Cobb “is letting politics get in the way of good economic development policies.”
Over the past five years, Gwinnett County has contributed an average of $500,000 each year. Another yearly $100,000 has come from its cities, $150,000 a year from the school system and about $60,000 each year from the community improvement districts.
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