Organizers hope to use a new Community Improvement District to give the declining Stone Mountain Industrial Park area a boost by using tax money to take on projects that will help local businesses.
The new district, approved Tuesday by the DeKalb County Commission, includes businesses in the corridor along and around Mountain Industrial Boulevard, from East Ponce de Leon Avenue to just north of Hugh Howell Road. The area also includes corridors to the east and west of East Ponce.
More than 80 property owners have agreed to participate, with a total property value of more than $240 million, according to a CID news release.
The annual budget for the district is expected to be about $480,000 and the CID will use the funds it collects to leverage federal and state grant money, often receiving up to 10 times the amount that they raise, the release said.
“Community Improvement Districts are good for a municipality because they augment services provided and give the commercial property owners another tool to improve their bottom line,” County Commissioner Larry Johnson said. “Things such as extra police patrols, lighting, streetscape improvements and the like can be handled through the CID.”
Johnson said money generated from the district can be used for improvement projects that might wait years if funding was dependent on the county or state.
A CID allows an area to pay for certain additional governmental services, according to the Georgia Cities Foundation. The district’s administration can levy taxes, fees and assessments within the CID up to 2.5 percent of the assessed value of the nonresidential property in the district.
Joey Chapman, vice president of Air Filter Sales & Service in Tucker, said he’s looking forward to some of the services the CID can provide, such as security patrols.
“In the past six months we’ve had trucks broken into and one truck stolen,” he said. “And it will be more economical and beneficial to have security for everyone as opposed to just our company.”
Chapman said he’s not excited about paying more in taxes, “but this way we have some say in how the money is used.”
“The birth of the Stone Mountain CID will show that it is possible, practical and desirable for property owner in these areas to pick up and take control of the future of their areas in close coordination with their county, regional, state and federal authorities,” said Emory Morsberger, one of the founders of the CID.
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