It’s over: Hogansville approves SDS proposal, ending 10 months of negotiations between county, cities
Published 6:12 pm Wednesday, May 26, 2021
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
The Hogansville City Council unanimously approved the Service Delivery Strategy Wednesday evening, officially putting an end to 10-month long negotiation between Troup County and the three local cities.
The city of LaGrange and Troup County had already passed the proposal, doing so on Monday and Tuesday. Hogansville was the third and last required vote. West Point has not voted on the proposal.
The SDS is required every 10 years in all 159 counties and is meant to ensure delivery of services to citizens in a cost-efficient and effective manner. For it to pass, the county, LaGrange and 50 percent of the other municipalities (West Point or Hogansville) have to agree to pass it. Throughout the process, West Point never took an official vote on the SDS proposal but consistently asked for mediation — which was the next step in the process if no agreement was reached.
Hogansville also approved a fire services agreement with the county, which was the sticking point throughout recent negotiations.
“Well, I think after much negotiation, give and take, we finally got an agreement that we all could live with,” said Hogansville Mayor Bill Stankiewicz. “Negotiations typically result in an agreement that nobody’s happy with but everybody can live with. You never get everything you want. In this case, I think we have a good agreement that we can live with — all of us can live with.”
As part of the agreement, Hogansville not have to pay the county for fire services for the first two years, a savings of nearly $400,000.
Troup County Chairman Patrick Crews said Wednesday evening the county will send the SDS agreement to the Department of Community Affairs for review. DCA requires 30-days to review the document but should be able to before the end of June, which was the deadline for an agreement.
This story will be updated with more information. LDN reporter Cole Trahan contributed to this report.