Lee Has a New Cobb Budget Plan

Chairman Tim Lee told the other members of the Cobb Board of Commissioners on Monday that he had an alternative plan other than cutting the libraries and senior centers to deal with the $31 million budget gap.

He didn't provide details at the morning work session but promised to meet with the individual commissioners Monday afternoon. The board's regular meeting is at 9 a.m. Tuesday.

The county has gotten more than 3,000 e-mails from residents opposed to the chairman's former proposal, said a county spokesman.

Under Lee’s previous budget-balancing plan, the The Marietta Daily Journal is reporting massive cuts to the county's library and senior services.

Among the library closures in Lee's proposal are the East Cobb and East Marietta branches. 

The MDJ says Lee’s proposal to close a deficit this fiscal year estimated at more than $31 million would close 13 of 17 libraries countywide, three senior centers, two swimming pools and the Mable House amphitheater, as well as cutting back on other services. Each county department would be asked to cut its budget by 3.5 percent, and the millage rate would rise by 0.5 mil for the fire fund, costing the owner of a $200,000 home $40 a year.

The county commissioners will enact a plan Tuesday morning to eliminate the $31 million deficit projected for fiscal 2011, which runs through Sept. 30. Sinking property values, now expected to fall 7 percent on average in this year’s assessments, have produced the budget gap.

The tax increase would defy the consensus the commission reached March 22 after a budget work session, when only West Cobb Commissioner Helen Goreham spoke in favor of considering raising taxes.

East Cobb Commissioner Bob Ott held two town-hall meetings on the budget recently and did not waver in his opposition to a tax increase.

“What we have to do once again is make sure we are using our assets as efficiently as possible,” Ott said Wednesday night at a meeting in Smyrna. “You have to look at the cost of the services being provided and are we giving something away, because we just can't afford to do that anymore.”

Last Wednesday night Commissioner Bob Ott floated the idea of alternating opening days for libraries near each other, but he did not talk about closing libraries.

He said he spent Wednesday going through the budget suggestions submitted by the public, “and by far the most comments are on libraries. I would say generally the comments are that during these hard economic times, it's where people can go look for jobs, get on the Internet. There are a lot of services and I think the board recognizes that.”

Helen Poyer, the director of the Cobb County Public Library System, sent out an e-mail message last Thursday to library supporters, urging them to lobby commissioners to protect the libraries. The note warned that Lee’s plan would keep open only the Central, Mountain View, South Cobb and West Cobb libraries.

The board is under no obligation to enact any of Lee’s plans but needs to take some kind of action on the budget Tuesday.

One option to attack the deficit is to furlough the county’s 4,239 full-time workers, rather than giving each department the option to decide how to cut a certain amount. Each furlough day is worth $671,871 for the general fund, Finance Director James Pehrson said last month.

To put that in perspective, two furlough days would save about the same amount of money as closing the 13 libraries for five months.

Patch will cover the Board of Commissioners’ meeting live Tuesday morning at 9.