County commissioners looked at several options to reduce the county's fudning of non-profits agencies at Tuesday night's work session.
The discussion stemmed the controversy at the end of last year and the beginning of this year surrounding a funding request from Ceek to Fulfill, a non-profit that works with at risk youth and teens in foster care.
Some of those options ranged from funding only those agencies with services the county is mandated to provide, having a transition period with caps on groups already funded, and a round up donation program with Rockdale Water Resources water payments.
Another option proposed by the chairman - creating a committee of seven to nine community members to approve applications for funds - was described by the two part-time commissioners as still having the potential to get into political controversy.
Commissioner Nesbitt said, "We’ve got to do some serious soul searching as a board as to whether we want to projects ourselves in that positions again as a board."
"You can call it cold blooded, you can call it heartless. I call it making a decision, and it’s a tough decision."
"Some of those services can be life or death," said Van Ness. "But I think it’s important for us to understand, we are in a financial crunch. And if we are going to apply that principal across the board in all measures, I would be willing to concede and look at yours," she said to Nesbitt, referring to his proposal to stop funding non-profits with non-mandated services. She added that she would like to see a transition period for 2012.
"It would be a reduced amount we would be looking at, and we could move forward fromt here with a plan to transition them off the financial rolls,"
Discussion of the policy will continue over the next weeks.
2011 Capital Budget
The other main business of the evening was presenting the 2011 Captial Budget general fund requests. The county has about $2.5 million available for equipment and captial.
The Rockdale County Sheriff's Office requested $732,480 for 15 new patrol cars - a number that is far below the 50 cars needed, said Sheriff Jeff Wigington.
The Tax Commissioner's Office is requesting a $250,000 property tax software replacement.
MIS (the IT department) is requesting a total of $756,743 in equipment, expansion and programs. The department is "constrained from producing solutions," said Director Jim Howell.
The Recreation and Maintenance departement is requesting $148,000, which includes a new roof for the Johnson Park buidling that houses the pool, new fire alarm system for the courthouse, and a new roof for the Harallson-Mill Parish House.
In other BOC business:
- The county will be soon bidding out design and engineering work for the second phase of the Ga. Highway 138 beautification project from the I-20 interchange up to the entrance of the Georgia International Horse Park. The project, funded by a federal grant of approximately $426,000 total for the second phase, includes landscaping, curb building, and other beautification changes.
The first phase of the project was finished last year and extended on Ga. Highway 138 from I-20 south until the Ga. 20 and Ga. 138 split.
- The Keep Rockdale Clean and Beautiful committee will reconvene on Feb. 3, 6:30 p.m. Two more volunteers will be appointed to the committee - Bonnie Clark and Josue Dejesus.
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(Feb. 1, 7:52 p.m.) County commissioners discussed several options to regulate and reduce the county's funding of non-profits and agencies at tonight's BOC work session. Some of those options ranged from funding only those agencies with services the county is mandated to provide, having a transition period with caps on groups already funded, and a round up donation program with Rockdale Water Resources water payments.
Discussion of the policy will continue over the next weeks.
Check back to www.rockdalenews.com later for the full story.
