While ostensibly trying to shrink its financial girth to avoid raising taxes in coming years, Fulton County plans to add a division that some say means more government fat, including nearly $275,000 in new salaries.
Supporters, however, say a new Division of Economic Development will bring in industry and jobs and spur population growth throughout the state's largest county. It will also add to the tax base, they say, and keep a rate hike for hundreds of thousands of property owners off the table.
“That’s a small amount of money to invest that will bring in millions to the county,” said Fulton County Development Authority Executive Director C. Clayton Powell, whose agency uses bond deals and tax abatements to woo employers and developers, but doesn’t actively recruit them.
The Board of Commissioners narrowly voted in December to spend $750,000 on such an effort this year, which includes five new positions and one existing employee. Proponents, including Chairman John Eaves, envision it as a coordinating agency working with chambers of commerce, development authorities and cities' economic development departments throughout the county to court businesses.
But the fact that so many agencies already exist has led some leaders to question why Fulton needs another one. The county and Atlanta have at least a half dozen chambers and development authorities and most of the other 13 Fulton cities fund some kind of economic development effort.
"I think we already have enough agencies in the game," said Sandy Springs Mayor Eva Galambos, whose city is paying up to $50,000 for an economic development manager.
Those on the commission who voted against the new agency have been urging their colleagues to reconsider before a final budget gets approved this month. Commissioner Robb Pitts predicts the cost of the division will swell to $1 million per year with travel and entertainment expenses.
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Meanwhile, as Fulton property values continue a downward spiral, the county's revenues are expected to come in nearly $14 million less this year than in 2011, while spending climbs by $44 million.
"We can't afford it," Pitts said of the new division. "It's a luxury."
That viewpoint is shortsighted, Eaves and other supporters said.
"This is one of the very few departments that is revenue generating," the chairman said.
North Fulton Commissioner Liz Hausmann, one of the four "yes" votes, cited a recent poll conducted for The Atlanta Journal-Constitution and the Georgia Newspaper Partnership which found that 39 percent of registered Georgia voters believe the economy and job creation should be the top priority in the current state legislative session.
Hausmann said if the division doesn't pay off, she'll be the first to call for pulling its plug.
The county's old economic development department dissolved during the last decade,. Fulton is the only core metro Atlanta county without its own economic development department.
Cobb County's Economic Development Office has three full-time employees and a $366,000 budget. Gwinnett contracts with the Gwinnett Chamber of Commerce for $500,000 per year, and then has three employees who support the effort costing $303,000 per year. DeKalb's Economic Development Office has six employees and an annual budget of $690,000.
South Fulton Commissioner Bill Edwards said he expects his end of the county to be short-changed, with the new division more likely to steer businesses to Atlanta or north Fulton.
"I think this is an excuse for people to fly all over the world, using the excuse of economic development," he said.
His district already has a South Fulton Chamber of Commerce and the county has budgeted $250,000 to hire an economic development agency serving the incorporated area, funded by its extra tax rate.
Greater North Fulton Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Brandon Beach said Fulton sorely needs a centralized business recruitment arm.
"I think it's a step in the right direction to help bring the county together," Beach said. "I don't think it's a north-south issue."
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