A proposal to reshape MARTA's board of directors has Fulton County's north-south tensions boiling again, with county leaders blasting the plan as racist and accusing Northside leaders of trying to bring back segregation.
Pending state legislation would diminish the county government's sway over MARTA's board in an effort to give north Fulton taxpayers more input on future rail and bus route expansions in their area.
The bill, which cleared the House on Crossover Day, would give two of the commission's three board appointments to the north Fulton mayors. The commission's lobbyists have been ordered to fight back.
House Bill 1052 is sponsored by Rep. Mike Jacobs, a Republican from north DeKalb County and chairman of the MARTA Oversight Committee. Jacobs said with all of north Fulton's taxpayers living in cities, those cities' leaders should decide who represents them on the board.
"To the extent that the Fulton County Commission is objecting," Jacobs said, "it's driven by personal power and not the realities of how transportation policy is set in north Fulton County these days."
The Fulton commission currently gets three appointments to the 12-member board, two from north of Atlanta and one from south of Atlanta.
Commissioners were livid, voting Wednesday to formally oppose the measure on grounds that the mayors, unlike the county, have no contractual relationship with MARTA and no control over the 1-cent MARTA sales tax currently paid by Fulton and DeKalb residents.
Chairman John Eaves called it "very divisive legislation," with MARTA "is being unfairly held hostage" in the agency's effort to end the state's requirement that 50 percent of money raised by the sales tax be spent on facilities and equipment and 50 percent go toward maintenance and operations. MARTA wants to spend more on operations.
MARTA board Chairman Frederick Daniels, a DeKalb appointee, said the board would prefer the legislature not tinker with their structure again.
"If the board is reconstituted this year," the chairman said in a prepared statement, "it would be the second time in two years that the structure has changed and its continuity challenged again."
Commissioner Robb Pitts said the bill is flawed because it doesn't give south Fulton's seven mayors any appointments. South Fulton Commissioner Bill Edwards pointed out that decades ago, the northern suburbs wanted no part of MARTA.
"The legislation is not flawed," Edwards said. "It's racist."
Vice Chair Emma Darnell said the bill would disenfranchise the Southside. She also brought up the forming of new north Fulton cities, which she called "segregation based upon race and income."
Since 2005, three communities north of Atlanta voted to incorporate, a backlash against a perception of lackluster services and poor representation by the county government. One effect has been a higher tax rate on unincorporated south Fulton, the only area still under direct county governance.
"In my district, from Bankhead to Buckhead, we have no intention of going back [to segregation]," Darnell said. "There's too much blood back there."
Sandy Springs Councilman Gabriel Sterling said he recognized the Fulton commission's tone.
"Part of the rationale for us wanting to become cities is attitudes like that," Sterling said of Darnell's comments, "where our needs and aspirations were ignored."
Johns Creek Mayor Mike Bodker said north Fulton residents have been paying the MARTA tax for decades, but have seen little return. Jacobs' bill would help rectify that, he said.
"Arguably," Bodker said, "we're paying for something that we do not get."
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