Future relationship of jointly owned Government Center on ‘front burner’ for Albany, Dougherty officials

ALBANY — It’s not unusual for city and county governments to have disagreements and differences of opinion. But some Albany and Dougherty County officials say the downtown Government Center should not be one of those issues.

The two entities plan to have a discussion in the near future about the future of the nearly 30-year-old facility that they share for office space.

During a Tuesday work session, the Albany City Commission selected Commissioners Matt Fuller and Jon Howard as the city’s representatives to take part in the planned discussion.

The five-story structure was developed through the Albany-Dougherty Inner City Authority, a now-defunct agency that issued the bonds for construction that took place during 1992 and 1993, Dougherty County Administrator Michael McCoy said during a telephone interview following Tuesday’s meeting. The city and county were each responsible for retiring one-half of the bonds.

“This is really a result of some administrative housekeeping from some time ago when the building was conceived and developed during the 1990s,” McCoy said of the upcoming discussions. “We are now working with the city to formalize ownership, use and operation of the facility.”

Currently, the county is providing upkeep on the facility and billing the city for its share of costs. The county owns two adjacent parking decks on the east and west side of the Government Center, while the city owns the fountain area to the north.

Ultimately, Albany City Commissioner Chad Warbington said, it is the public that owns the building.

“Really we don’t have a vision for what that building is going to be in five or 10 years,” Warbington said during a telephone interview. “Part of it is about today; part of it is about tomorrow. This gets the commissions to work together. I hope we have a productive meeting … as long as we keep the citizens as the focus.”

McCoy said the meeting likely will be held in the near future.

“We look forward to working with them,” he said. “This is on the front burner. This is a high priority for the County Commission and the City Commission. We are looking forward to resolving this issue. I’m fairly confident we can get it done.”

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