Cobb County is looking to change the way it funds stormwater after years of severe flooding, a backlog of sinkhole and pipe repairs, and a historic lack of investment in stormwater infrastructure.
The county has been studying the new fee structure for years. Experts say more investment in stormwater is desperately needed to ease the severe flooding that has afflicted the region for years, including the 2021 floods that damaged hundreds of homes in east Cobb and across the northern suburbs.
The proposed changes, up for a vote on Tuesday, calculate the fee based on the amount of a property’s impervious surface — concrete and other surfaces that prevent the absorption of water. The fee is currently based on the amount of water used.
The fee structure could bring in between $8.5 million and $15.4 million per year, which at the lowest level would match current collections. If set at higher levels, the fee could cover the current budget plus additional staff needed to address the work order backlog and additional services, according to Judy Jones, the Cobb County water department director.
Jones said water usage has little relation to a property’s actual impact on the stormwater system, and the issues will only get worse if they don’t increase stormwater funding.
“We have customers that have waited 10 years to have a sinkhole fixed in their backyard. That should not happen,” Jones said during a recent town hall meeting in east Cobb. “But I have to have more money to do that. ... I am trying to find ways to fix a situation that is broken.”
The fee would be a slight increase for most residents, and a significant increase for commercial properties. Businesses with large parking lots have more runoff and would pay higher fees, for example.
The Cobb cities of Acworth, Austell, Kennesaw, Powder Springs and Smyrna each collect stormwater utility fees, along with DeKalb, Gwinnett, and Clayton counties. Statewide, over 60 jurisdictions collect the fee.
The city of Atlanta currently has a 1% Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax to fund stormwater, which is up for renewal in the May primary election. It was first implemented in 2004 after a federal consent decree required the city to make billions of dollars in stormwater infrastructure improvements.
Cobb’s fee, if approved, would likely fall between $2.17 and $4.00 per month for the average residential water customer with 3,700 square feet of impervious surface — the roof, driveway, and any uncovered patio and gravel. Water and sewer rates would also decrease slightly to account for the shift.
Residents across metro Atlanta have long dealt with floods, worsened in recent years by an aging infrastructure, a lack of a regional investment, and more frequent severe weather. An Atlanta Journal Constitution investigation in 2010 found that booming development and poor planning “helped turn even unremarkable rainstorms into costly, property-wrecking events in metro Atlanta.”
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The AJC investigation found zoning practices had not been updated to ensure proper flood mitigation in new neighborhoods. And while changes have been made since, with more strict zoning laws and dedicated stormwater utility fees in many local governments, residents find themselves in a similar situation 14 years later.
“Twenty-plus years ago, there just weren’t stormwater regulations in place,” said Joseph Santoro, the director of policy and government affairs for the Council for Quality Growth. “We have seen increased storms with the outdated infrastructure in place, and without the necessary funding to address a lot of those concerns.”
The American Society of Civil Engineers evaluates state infrastructure status in report cards every few years to help increase awareness of infrastructure needs, including stormwater. In Georgia’s most recent report card from 2019 received a “C-” for stormwater, with experts urging local governments to implement fees and coordinate stormwater mitigation across the region.
“Communities lack the funding required to adequately maintain their stormwater conveyance systems,” the report says. “Unfortunately, in many cases stormwater system upgrades do not make the final list of funded projects because of a lack of information on the subject, or lack of urgency regarding the importance of these systems to community health and welfare.”
Jones said the Cobb water system has a severe backlog of work orders: around 100 orders for sinkhole and pipe repairs are waiting to be fixed, and that’s only accounting for what the county is responsible for fixing.
“It will take us a couple of years to get caught up,” she said. “What’s created the backlog of work orders is not putting enough funding ... towards stormwater repairs to be able to keep up.”
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The Council for Quality Growth, a nonprofit trade association that advocates on land use issues in the 10-county metropolitan area, is bringing together those in the public and private sector to find regional stormwater solutions and partnerships and supports the establishment of dedicated fees for stormwater. But the lack of understanding about the infrastructure’s importance makes finding solutions more challenging, Santoro said.
“As the metro Atlanta urbanizes and becomes more and more densely developed, that robust stormwater infrastructure improves not only water quality, mitigates flooding, but it also protects our ecosystems,” Santoro said.
Danielle Hopkins is the executive director of the Southeast Stormwater Association, which is made up of stormwater professionals in public and private sectors across the southeast. The association encourages local governments to create a stormwater utility fee.
She said the different laws and standards from jurisdiction to jurisdiction make it difficult for leaders to take a regional approach to addressing stormwater problems, but creating a utility fee is one local step that can help governments approach stormwater proactively when planning for population growth and new development.
“Once you get funding, you can build a plan for the infrastructure, and catalog and take care of it and maintain it,” Hopkins said. “If there’s not a plan for that, you’re just reacting to problems that have happened versus planning ahead.”
For Cobb County, Commissioner JoAnn Birrell has remained steadfast to her opposition to a fee while the county transfers 6% of its water and sewer revenue to the general fund. But Jones said even if that 6% was kept in the water department, only a fraction would be eligible to use for stormwater — nowhere near enough for the water department to address its backlog, much less take proactive actions to improve the system.
“If we eliminated the general fund transfer, it is not going to make a dent in stormwater,” Jones said.
The Cobb County Board of Commissioners will hold a work session at 1:30 p.m. Tuesday, March 26, and a second public hearing on the stormwater code amendments that evening at the 7 p.m. board meeting, when they will also vote on the proposal.
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