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We appreciate the fine effort by Angela Mapes Turner in the story about the tax abatement process in DeKalb County, “Battered counties embrace biz lure: DeKalb’s tax plan tags farms ‘obsolete’ ” (Nov. 9).
The DeKalb County Council is actively reviewing processes that may impede our ability to attract industrial prospects to the county. One issue was the extra 30 days to process a tax abatement application by having to declare an economic revitalization area for each and every application. The extra administrative step required a second perfunctory meeting with the company that was essentially not valuable to anyone. By declaring the unincorporated areas an economic revitalization area, we were able to save people time and expense and improve our efficiency without losing any control of the review process.
One gentleman, Mike Walter from Auburn, was interviewed for the article and expressed his opinion that labeling everything in the unincorporated county as obsolete was “absurd.” Walter also expressed this opinion at the public hearing of the County Council. At that meeting, it was explained to him that there are several criteria available for an economic revitalization area. The council members proceeded to approve the change based on their knowledge of the law and the need to be proactive in DeKalb County.
The use of the word “obsolete” is Walter’s choice, not the County Council’s. The law allows an economic revitalization area under the words of “lack of development,” “cessation of growth,” as well as others. Those are certainly appropriate words to use for the unincorporated areas of DeKalb County. Why one individual would choose “obsolete” over the other choices baffles me and seems absurd to me.
What we need are DeKalb citizens who acting in concert, collaboratively and proactively to promote our area. Selective nitpicking and self-promotion are not in the best interests of our economic health and prosperity and are not appreciated by the conscientious and hardworking citizens of DeKalb County.
One individual’s misplaced comments can cast a pall over all the hard work the rest of us are doing to turn our economic ordeal around. It is time for Walter to be less absurd and add value to our discussions.
GALEN EBERHART Director DeKalb County Economic Development Partnership
