Franklin Co Commissioner Calls on County to Revisit TSPLOST Penalty

A Franklin County Commissioner is asking the County to find a way to have a monetary penalty repealed that was imposed by the State when voters rejected the T-SPLOST referendum.

In July of 2012, Franklin County voters said no to the State Transportation Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax.  Had it passed, the T-SPLOST would have helped fund County road projects and given Franklin County a discount when applying for state road grants.

At a recent work session, Commissioner Jeff Jacques said the County is now having to pay a higher match when applying for funding from the state for road projects.

“For years, historically, counties and cities have had to do a 10% monetary match for funding from the state for roads and bridge projects,” he told the Board. “For example, for a $400,000 project that would be a $40,000 match. But because we rejected T-SPLOST, we were penalized and extra 20% so that means for Franklin County that would be a 30% match or $120,000 on a $400,000 project just to be able to use grant money from the State of Georgia.”

Jacques said over the years since, the County has actually lost money because of having to come up with more in matching funds just to get a Local Maintenance Improvement Grant (LMIG) grant.

“If you look at the 2013, 14, 15 and 16 budgets, and start adding an additional $80,000, that translates to over $300,000 from our budget that we have had to allocate for transportation projects and just to get funding from the State, instead of us having the latitude as a county to prioritize and use our money as we deem appropriate.”

Had it passed in Franklin County in 2012, T-SPLOST as proposed, would have returned about $1.3 million dollars a year to the County through 2022 to pay for any county road projects needed. Jacques
said that would have eliminated the need for the County to now have to consider raising the millage.

“Had we had just the additional 20% over three years, you’re looking at 4/10ths of a mill that we would not have to levy now,” he said. “We would have the money that we had collected (through T-SPLOST) and we would not be mandated.”

Jacques noted some counties in Georgia did approve a T-SPLOST in 2012 and are now reaping those benefits.

Jacques then called on the Board to look at whatever action is necessary to have the penalty repealed.

“I think it’s time to revisit this,” he said. “It’s time for our board to take what action we can and have this additional 20% penalty that was imposed repealed because the citizens failed to pass the (T-SPLOST) tax.”

Commission Chair Thomas Bridges said county staff would begin looking into Jacques’ proposal.