Funding that DeKalb County’s business leaders said was critical to start fixing the county’s outdated permits and licensing operations is back in the 2013 budget – and still with no tax hike for property owners.
In restoring the $600,000 to improve the computers and systems that handle everything from business licenses to building permits, DeKalb County commissioners agreed the upgrades are critical to recruiting and retaining businesses.
The money for the project will come from the $30 million reserve, keeping the budget the board adopted Tuesday at $559 million with no tax increase.
“We are a pro-economic development board,” Commissioner Larry Johnson said. “We are not standing in the way of getting things to happen.”
The budget also includes money to fill 44 posts in the fire department and 25 in the police department.
Both departments have been operating well under full staff, the fire department with 91 percent of its force and police at just 82 percent of full staff.
The staffing struggles have created morale problems and worries about longer response times for emergency calls. And the fire department has been rolling to calls with only three firefighters on trucks instead of the county’s stated goal of four firefighters on each call.
“We have not put any recruits out in the field for years,” said Kevin Cavanaugh, secretary of the DeKalb Professional Firefighters Local #1492. “We need these people.”
It is unlikely the county’s permitting office will see any new hires, despite the restoration of money for upgrades.
Luz Borrero, deputy chief operating director of development, said she will first spend $300,000 for an outside analysis of the departments that handle the paperwork necessarily for all businesses. The county has yet to bid for that consultant.
Only when that report makes it clear how to streamline the process – such as buying computer equipment to allow online applications or creating a point person to untangle the red tape for all development – will the $600,000 be used to begin making changes. That isn’t expected until the end of the year.
“Everybody knows DeKalb County makes it impossible to do business,” said Rebekah Coblentz, a senior property manager for NAI Brannen and Goddard who has struggled to lure new firms to vacant space in Tucker.
“You find the money, and you have to decide to make it better,” she added.
The 2013 budget also includes a $100,000 increase for the county’s 22 libraries, which doubles funding to buy books and other materials, and $300,000 for a new computer system at Recorders municipal court.
The county also cut $250,000 from the budget by eliminating the public safety director job and shaved $100,000 from the county’s lobbying contracts with firms that advocate on its behalf at the state and federal level.
The commission will not set the final millage rate until June. That is when the county adopts its so-called mid-year budget, which will have a better grasp on how much property taxes will bring in to county coffers this year.
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