PORTERDALE, Ga. – The Porterdale city council met Monday to discuss several topics, one of which was House Bill 581.
Like other neighboring local governments, the council weighed the pros and cons of the bill before coming to the consensus that the city of Porterdale would remain opted in. This decision comes as entities across Newton County finalize their decisions, making Porterdale the last city to show its hand.
Vickie Short, city manager, explained the bill to the council and attendees. Short presented the room with projected figures of revenue loss that Porterdale could see in the years to come. Short anticipated that by 2029, Porterdale could lose about $23,000 in revenue from the lack of increasing property taxes.
This projection is significantly less damaging than the predictions of other entities across the county. Specifically, the Newton County Board of Education and Board of Commissioners, being representative of larger regions and employing more people, project upwards of millions of dollars in revenue loss in the years to come that could create significant strain.
Based on a future projection shown by Martie Kinard, the county’s chief appraiser, at the Jan. 16 board of commissioners meeting, with the homestead exemption in place for the next three years, Newton County would lose an estimated $4.7 million in revenue.
For the city of Porterdale, however, the damages are much more minimal. The council did not seem to fear that the implementation of the homestead exemption would inhibit their ability to function efficiently in years to come.
“Each community is different,” Short said. “The concerns that we have in Porterdale is certainly [sic] different than Oxford or Covington. I think each community looks different in terms of home ownership and how many homes we have rented out.”
According to the council, the city of Porterdale has a sizable proportion of homes that are rentals, not homesteads. Rental homes are not subject to the proposed homestead exemption.
But the council seemed to hope that the implementation of tax exemptions for homeowners could incentivize people to select permanent residences over short-term rental housing.
“I know that for many, many years, we’ve struggled with the idea that Porterdale is a rental community,” Post 5 Councilman Lowell Chambers said. “People move in and they move out, then they move in and they move out. At one point we were 80 percent rental, and so if our objective as a community is to try and encourage long-term residents and long-term investment, I think this is one of the tools that can be used to do it.”
Mayor Michael Patterson chimed in, predicting that the state legislature might rework and offer a new penny tax or similar plan for areas where one municipality may have chosen to opt out.
If any cities or the county choose to opt out, the remaining entities no longer have the option to band together and implement a FLOST, or floating local option sales tax, that could have made up for potential revenue losses.
“I’m not clear exactly how it would even be right to allow one municipality in the county to hold the entire county and other municipalities within it hostage if they decide to opt out for the best interest of their community,” Patterson said. “However, as it is stated, that’s the way the law is at the moment.”
When Patterson asked if any of the council members felt that the county should consider opting out of HB581, no one spoke up. With that, the mayor decidedly stated that Porterdale would stay in and the meeting continued.
As of now, Oxford, Newborn and Social Circle seem to still be considering opting out of HB581, as they are still hosting public hearings on the matter. Covington and Mansfield have decidedly stated that they will opt in, and the county government seems poised to do the same.
All opt out decisions must be made by March 1.
