County Commission allocates almost $1.8 million of ARP funds (View videos here)

February 8, 2022
By: Dwayne Page

The DeKalb County Commission has committed almost $1.8 million of its $3.98 million share of federal American Rescue Plan Act funding although much of the money will not be spent right away.

The county received authorization to draw down $1.9 million of the total ARP funding last summer and the rest is expected to be drawn down this year.

(View video below of the county commission discussing allocation of ARP funds 9 minutes into the video. The rest of the discussion and vote can be viewed in the second video below)

The county commission has held several informal meetings in recent months to identify projects for the ARP expenditures and Monday night (February 28) voted to commit funding to several of them including $88,642 for 4- Lucas chest compression devices and $96,864 for 3-Zoll heart monitors for DeKalb EMS; $50,000 for an underwater camera, $7,000 for a raft, and $6,500 for a drone for the Smithville-DeKalb County Rescue Squad; $26,000 for an outdoor self-service (vehicle registration renewal) kiosk for the County Clerk’s Office; and $398,000 as a local grant match for construction of a new county $3.9 million health department center to be funded mostly by the state. In December the county commission also allocated $750,000 of ARP funding to help support completion of DTC Communication’s fiber infrastructure build in portions of DeKalb County.

In addition to the ARP funds, the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation is providing $3,730, 767 in funds to the county to be used strictly for water and sewer needs and distributed on an 80/20 grant match basis per project. TDEC will fund 80% of the match with the remaining 20% to be provided by a local source. The county commission has allocated $373,000 in ARP money to fund 10% of the 20% local match per project with DeKalb County water utility applicants to fund the other 10%.

For example, if a utility applied for a one-million-dollar water project, TDEC would supply 80% of the funding while the county’s ARP funds would support half of the 20% local match or 10% while the utility would have to agree to fund the remaining 10% match.

During Monday night’s county commission meeting, sixth district member Matt Adcock made a motion to include an allocation of ARP funding for all the projects that were up for a vote during the meeting plus the County Clerk’s outdoor kiosk. Second district commissioner Myron Rhody offered a second to the motion. Adcock said County Clerk James L. (Jimmy) Poss had agreed that if the county would purchase the kiosk with ARP funds, he would use his office’s earmarked fees to pay the annual $5,000 maintenance fee on the machine.

Although he supported spending ARP money on the other projects, fifth district member Jerry Adcock questioned a need for the kiosk saying it was a waste of taxpayer money.

County Mayor Tim Stribling replied that “this is something the whole county could use, and it would be accessible 24 hours a day”.

Fourth district member Janice Fish Stewart added that the kiosk would be a convenient service to the public.

“For the people in the county who have children that play ball and do things like this, and they work late I see this Kiosk as being very beneficial to them. We also have a lot of people in the county who work out of town. It sure would be nice to have something like that for people and to put it in a central location outside Jimmy’s office so he can monitor it better,” said Commissioner Stewart.

Some commissioners have suggested that if a kiosk is purchased it should be placed in Alexandria for the convenience of people in the western portion of the county.

County Clerk Poss said since the county is only considering the purchase of one kiosk at this time it should be centrally located.

“If we’re buying one machine, I want to keep it centrally located because for example I don’t want to tell the people at Wright Bend (Belk Community) or Riverwatch they have to drive 40 minutes because that takes away their convenience. I would also like to have it outside my office because there would be a large roof area over it to keep the rain and sun off the machine and the people. It has a security camera, electricity, and other things that would be an extra cost if that were not available at another location,” added Poss.

Fifth district commissioner Anita Puckett then made a motion that another project be added to the list of ARP funding allocations for approval Monday night. “I have been talking about this for the last four months to spend $450,000 on memorial parks and playgrounds at all community center sites including at Johnsons Chapel, Belk, Keltonburg, Blue Springs, Snow Hill, Temperance Hall, and Midway,” she said. Puckett’s motion died for the lack of a second. Although it failed funding for the playgrounds issue could be raised again at another meeting.

Commissioner Jerry Adcock then tried to amend Commissioner Matt Adcock’s motion to lump together all the projects up for a vote Monday night by having the commission vote on each one separately. Commissioner Bruce Malone offered a second to the motion, but it failed 10-4.

On the final vote, the commission voted unanimously 14-0 to allocate ARP money (as identified above in this story) for the DeKalb EMS, Rescue Squad, kiosk, and local match for the health department and TDEC grants. The total amount including the DTC allocation comes to $1,796,006 which leaves a balance of almost $2.2 million of DeKalb County ARP Funding yet to be allocated.

Under ARP guidelines, all the money has to be obligated by December 31, 2024, and completely expended by the end of 2026. In addition to the county’s allocation, the school district and the municipalities are getting their own share of ARP funding.

March 1, 2022
By: Dwayne Page

Four people were arrested in a Monday night drug bust by the DeKalb and Warren County Sheriff’s Departments while executing a search warrant at 745 Adcock Cemetery Road.

Found inside the residence were a variety of drugs including methamphetamine, heroin, marijuana, Xanax, Subutex, methadone, and oxycodone, along with scales, baggies and other drug paraphernalia in addition to items believed to have been stolen during a recent burglary and theft at a Smithville church.

Those charged are 42-year-old Tawanna Ann Evans of Hooper Street; 49-year-old Melisha Renne Martin of Adcock Cemetery Road; 53-year-old Dickie Bain of Old Snow Hill Road; and 36-year-old Justin Lynn Murphy, Sr. of Highland Street. All are to appear in court March 17.

A detective of the Smithville Police Department was summoned to the scene to gather information about the discovery from the church burglary. Other charges may be pending from that investigation.

Charges against each of the four are as follows:

Tawanna Ann Evans: Possession of a Schedule I drug (Heroin), Schedule II drug (Suboxone), and Schedule IV drug (Xanax) with intent to sell or deliver along with possession of drug paraphernalia. Bond $75,000. Inside her bedroom were heroin, Xanax pills, buprenorphine pills, a large amount of baggies, scales, pipes and other paraphernalia. She also had an additional 1.08 grams of heroin on her person.

Melisha Renne Martin: Possession of Methamphetamine with intent to manufacture, sell or deliver; Possession of a Schedule II drug (Methadone); Possession of a Schedule I drug (Heroin); Possession of a Schedule IV (Xanax); Possession of a Schedule II drug (Oxycodone); and Possession of a Schedule VI drug (Marijuana) with intent to sell or deliver. Bond $95,000. Inside her bedroom were heroin, Xanax pills, Oxycodone, methadone pills, methamphetamine, marijuana, and a large amount of baggies, scales, pipes and other paraphernalia. Inside a car registered to Martin were additional marijuana and meth.

Dickie Ray Bain: Possession of drug paraphernalia, Possession of a Schedule IV drug (Xanax), Possession of a Schedule III drug (Suboxone), and Possession of a Schedule I drug (Heroin) with intent to sell or deliver. Bond $75,000. Inside his bedroom were heroin, Xanax pills, buprenorphine pills, a large amount of baggies, scales, pipes and other paraphernalia. Additional baggies and paraphernalia were located in a truck outside the residence registered to Bain. He also had a large amount of cash on him which was seized.

Justin Lynn Murphy, Sr.: Possession of a Schedule I drug (Heroin), Possession of a Schedule III drug (Suboxone); and Possession of a Schedule IV drug (Xanax) with intent to sell or deliver. Bond $75,000. Inside his bedroom were heroin, Xanax pills, buprenorphine pills, a large amount of baggies, scales, pipes and other paraphernalia. He also had a glass pipe in his pocket.

March 1, 2022
By: Dwayne Page

Builders and homeowners will not have to worry about dealing with impact fees on new residential and commercial construction in DeKalb County any time soon.

(The county commission discusses the impact fees issue 8 minutes and 40 seconds into the video below)

Although the issue had originally been included as an agenda item for Monday night’s regular monthly meeting of the county commission, it was removed prior to the session after it was discovered that DeKalb County does not have the statutory authority to implement impact fees as a means of raising revenue to fund other projects such as school construction according to the County Technical Assistance Service (CTAS) which gives advice to county governments.

Seventh district county commissioner Bruce Malone, who raised the issue during Thursday night’s committee of the whole meeting of the county commission, said the county is missing out on new revenue opportunities with the housing boom the last few years and he would like to see impact fees adopted and the money go for school construction projects. Under Malone’s plan, an impact fee of $1.00 per square foot would have been assessed for new residential and $2.00 per square foot for new commercial construction plus an additional $500 per plan. The fees would not have applied to rehabilitation or remodeling projects of existing structures, nor would it have applied to the cities within the county which have their own ordinances and codes regarding construction. Because it applied to new construction, Malone said the impact fees would not have affected county taxpayers.

According to CTAS, “Impact fees are a means of regulating new development. The intent of the fee is to place the financial burden of new growth on areas in which the growth has occurred. The level of the fee must be related to the needs of new development, and revenues generated by the fee should be earmarked for investment in the growth areas. There is no specific statutory authority under general law for counties to impose impact fees. Prior to 2006, impact fees could be imposed by private act. After June 20, 2006, no county is authorized to enact an impact fee on development or a local real estate transfer tax by private or public act. T.C.A. § 67-4-2913”.

In the future the county might have the option of enacting a “County School Adequate Facilities Tax” on residential development to raise revenue which is not subject to the same standards as impact fees, but DeKalb County currently does not meet the criteria for imposing such a tax under the state’s “County Powers Relief Act”.

“Adequate facilities taxes are privilege taxes levied on the privilege of construction or development of property. The primary difference between an impact fee and an adequate facilities tax is one of intent: It is a tax if the primary purpose is to raise revenue, but it is a fee if the purpose is regulation of some activity under the government’s police power”.

According to CTAS, “The County Powers Relief Act” authorizes counties qualifying as “growth counties” to levy a county school facilities tax on residential development but the county must meet the criteria to be a growth county by one of two ways: (1) the county experienced a 20 percent or greater increase in population between the last two federal decennial censuses (or the county experiences that level of growth between any subsequent federal censuses); or (2) the county experienced a 9 percent or greater increase in population over the period from 2000 to 2004 (or over any subsequent four year period) and before the tax may be levied, the county is required to have adopted a capital improvement program. The tax can then be levied by a resolution adopted by a 2/3 vote of the entire membership of the county legislative body at two consecutive, regularly scheduled meetings. The tax may be levied initially at a rate not to exceed $1.00 per square foot. Square footage is determined based on the total heated or air-conditioned residential living space. Once adopted, the rate of the tax cannot be increased for four years. Once the four-year period has run, the county legislative body may increase the rate, but by no more than 10 percent. After any increase, the rate is again frozen for a four-year period. Public buildings, places of worship, barns and agricultural buildings, replacement buildings for structures damaged by disaster, buildings owned by 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporations, and buildings constructed in an area designated by the federal government as a blighted, distressed, or urban renewal zone are exempt from the tax. All revenue from this tax is turned over to the county trustee for deposit. The revenue is required by law to be used exclusively for funding growth-related capital expenditures for education, including the retirement of bonded indebtedness”.

Fourth District Commissioner Janice Fish Stewart suggested that the commission do a better job on its homework before proposing major initiatives like this in the future

“Unless we really research something we probably don’t need to put it on an agenda to vote to pass it if we are not really clear and don’t know what the statute exactly is. We were planning to bring it up tonight and it sounds like a great thing but there is a lot of criteria surrounding this particular issue that we wanted to do to raise some money to build schools and I know we all on this commission want to see schools built and things done for the kids but we don’t want to pass and implement something when we don’t have all the information we need to make that decision,” said Commissioner Stewart.

“I don’t think we need to drop this. I think this is a way to capture some growth. There are some things we were not aware of so there is some study or research we are going to have to do to capture this,” said Commissioner Malone.

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