The appeal of forming a new city is easy to understand. Promises of transparency and smaller, more responsible government are the usual song, but the long-term impact and negative effects are not as easy to grasp.
First, let’s discuss the term “unincorporated.” In DeKalb County, we all have a mailing address with a city’s name attached to it. For example, I live in Lithonia, an address that is not actually associated with the city government of Lithonia. I can’t vote for the mayor or City Council, and the city of Lithonia does not and cannot deliver one service to me or my neighborhood. Like roughly 70 percent of the county, I live in unincorporated DeKalb, and the county government delivers all my local government services.
When people talk about creating cities, they are talking about keeping certain revenues generated from taxes, fines and fees to fund their own city governments. Because state law is fuzzy, at best, when it comes to the creation of new cities, it has made this process combative and messy.
Many may not know this, but the only form of local government mandated to deliver certain services is county government. City governments are authorized to deliver services, but that means they can choose to deliver a certain service. Or not. Counties don’t have that luxury. State law only mandates that a new city deliver three services in order to incorporate. New cities are also able to buy county assets for pennies on the dollar. Those who remain in unincorporated areas are left footing the bill for many long-term, fixed costs of running government that are not easily eliminated.
Here’s an example: A police officer who served unincorporated DeKalb for 30 years retires. When a new city is formed, residents inside the city limits are no longer obligated to fulfill the retirement benefits to this worker, even though he served that community his entire career. That cost shifts to unincorporated residents.
But there is a greater impact other than revenues simply leaving the county. When maps are drawn for these cities, commercial and industrial areas are prime real estate because they draw in great revenues, and the cost to deliver services is extremely low — only 20 to 30 cents on the dollar.
Because of the impacts of these proposed incorporations, we asked Georgia Tech to analyze the impact on our county. We know that with the combined proposals of new cities and annexations, we see a potential loss of revenue of more than $100 million. This loss will have a major impact on service delivery to our constituents, whether they live in cities or in an unincorporated area.
Communities that incorporate will have ongoing pressure to raise taxes, and service delivery does not always translate into better service. The AJC’s analysis in “Cityhood solutions comes with pitfalls” (MyAJC.com, Jan. 24) was correct: “Political watchdogs and social scientists said these problems illustrate the pitfalls inherent in birthing a new government.” The AJC’s litany of problems that start-up cities stumbled into, including gift-taking, contract steering and free spending, underscores that premise.
The Georgia Legislature should take a strong look at the overall impacts of this process and create a better statewide practice for how communities form cities. As it stands now, the state is pitting communities against one another. People are drawing their lines in the sand, and it is hurting our communities all around.
Lee May is interim CEO of DeKalb County.
