The meeting with the college presidents and Albany Area Chamber of Commerce Vice President Wendy Martin was part of a marathon session at which state Rep. Winfred Dukes, Rep.-elect Carol Fullerton and state Sen.-elect Freddie Powell Sims discussed with city and county leaders the issues that will most impact Southwest Georgia as the 2009 legislative session draws near.
"Policymakers are facing some real challenges this year; that’s why it is so critical that we work together," Dukes, D-District 150, said. "The problems we face are not school board problems or city commission problems or county commission problems or the problems of our state delegation. They’re all our problems, and the only way we can address them and positively impact our region is to work on them together.
"That’s why I thought it was crucial to include the Chamber and our institutions of higher education in the discussion process this year. I’m not certain of the exact numbers, but Albany State has a roughly $92 million impact on this community; Darton (College) has an $88 million impact, and Albany Tech has an impact in the high $70 millions. We need to bring them into any discussion that includes academic as well as intellectual impact."
The legislative delegation, which was minus Rep. Ed Rynders, R-District 152, who was at a special called committee meeting Monday, made it clear that its series of meetings with the Dougherty County Commission, Albany City Commission, Dougherty Board of Education and the chamber/college presidents was about the business of addressing the needs of the region.
When Dougherty School Board member James Bush challenged Board Chairman Michael Windom’s statement that he "wasn’t sure what the board would do" if a promised property tax relief grant was returned to counties unfunded, Sims, D-District 12, offered a stern rebuke.
"All of the other boards we’ve met with today have shown a willingness to work together," Sims said. "I get the feeling this board is not together, and if that’s the case I’d rather you not waste my time or your time pointing fingers at each other."
Freeman told the legislators he’d like to see Albany-Dougherty County "sold as a work-ready community ... sold as a community whose health services rival anything outside a major U.S. city," promoted as vital to research and development for the U.S. military and promoted as a college town.
"Those four elements are critical," Freeman said. "If we’ve got to promote Phoebe Putney (Memorial Hospital) to promote our health services in this community, I don’t care. And if we’re going to continue to argue that we’re a college town, we’ve got to support our institutions."
Parker, who asked the legislators and chamber officials to promote the implementation of pharmacy and doctoral educational leadership programs at Albany State, said the community and governmental factions would best serve their constituents by pooling their ideas.
"We have some issues in common that we could better solve together," he said. "It would serve us all well to get a big win; if Albany State benefits, Darton and Albany Tech will benefit as well.
"I’ve been here 13 years now, and there has never been a voice giving marching orders to the institutions. We want someone with the vision to tell us what we need to do to get some of these things done."
Dougherty County Commissioner Lamar Hudgins asked the legislators about funds from the property tax relief grant that had been promised by the Legislature and included in the fiscal year 2009 budget.
The grant promised each county property owner a slightly more than $300 tax break this year and required that individual tax notices include wording informing taxpayers that the grant was provided by the state. Now, however, Gov. Sonny Perdue has mentioned the possibility of rescinding the promise in light of the state’s $1.8 billion shortfall.
"That money usually comes to us in October," Hudgins said. "We haven’t gotten it yet, and we don’t want to be in a position where we have to send out new tax bills and tell property owners the state is not going to keep its word.
"The only other option would be to take the money out of our reserves, and we don’t want to do that. We’d like to see the state do what it said it would do."
County Commissioner Chuck Lingle noted the commission’s continued concern about water usage in the state.
"The regional water management councils are a good idea," he said, "but there’s a question as to whether they’ll function the way they were intended without proper funding.
"We’re still concerned over the water situation in Atlanta. We don’t want any drinking straws from up there poking holes in our aquifer."
City commissioners asked the lawmakers to look at ways to address the area’s poverty and crime rates. Noting that the two are intertwined, Mayor Willie Adams said more programs were needed to educate inmates and help them find work once their incarceration ends.
Commissioner Jon Howard said the legislators needed to push for stricter laws.
"I never thought I’d see the day that I agreed with the Soviet Union, but we as elected officials have got to quit sugar-coating things," he said. "I think we’ve got to pass some tougher laws, some iron-fisted laws. The family values of this young hip-hop generation have just gone.
"There are areas of this city that I’m afraid to walk in at night."
Sims told school board members they may have to start looking at cutbacks in nonessential programs.
"What your saying is that we need to tighten our budget more and more," Windom said, "but when around 85 percent of your budget goes for salaries, then you’re talking about personnel. When you keep taking a little more here and a little more there out of the equation, the only thing left are the people and their positions."
Bush, who said more conversation was needed among members of the board’s finance committee, chided Windom for his response to a question by Dukes.
"I didn’t mean ’we’re not sure what we’ll do’ as an indication that we weren’t capable of answering the question," Windom said. "I meant that we’re not sure what action we’ll take at this time. We’ve already started discussing the possibilities."
Superintendent Sally Whatley noted that the "flexibility" that many in education are now calling for during tough economic times has its limitations.
"We don’t have a great deal of flexibility," she said. "About the only flexibility we have comes with making massive cuts."
Whatley told the legislators the Dougherty School System had made made than $16 million in austerity cuts since 2002.
"The challenges that you are facing are not only local challenges, they’re challenges being felt on the state and national levels," Fullerton, D-District 151, said. "This is the responsibility we take to the Capitol, and we’re prepared to respond to your concerns as best we can."
