Your last chance to voice your opinion on the Habersham County government’s budget plan for 2016 is coming up on Monday.

The Habersham County Board of Commissioners will conduct a second Public Hearing for the FY2015-2016 Budget on Monday June 22 at 6:00 pm in the Jury Assembly Room at the Courthouse in Clarkesville.   They are expected to vote on the plan at that meeting.

You can get copies of the proposed Budget in the Commission office located inside the old courthouse in downtown Clarkesville and there is a summary available on the Habersham County website.

Some of the major changes in the upcoming spending plan include hiring new employees in a number of departments, pay raises for all county employees and higher insurance expenses. Despite the increased costs, the overall property tax rate will remain the same.

New Hires

$336,311 is set aside for new hires but some of that will be funded by budget cuts in other areas. Sheriff Joey Terrell says he cut his department’s spending by $83,000. “We cut some overtime and some part time.” The savings covers about half the cost of hiring 2 new patrol officers and 2 detention center officers.  “We will hopefully be adding some extra personnel to the roads soon to better protect our citizens.”

* Includes salaries, benefits and other employee costs

Employee Pay Raises

Sheriff Terrell did not get the 5% increase in officer pay he’d asked for back in March. Instead, the county will boost all employee pay by 3.5%. “We asked for 5% because we’re losing people. We’re losing people to industry because they can make more money and get better insurance,” explains Sheriff Terrell. While it’s less than he’d hoped, he says he is satisfied with what commissioners are willing to do, “The 3.5% the county is considering is a good thing because you have to try to retain your employees.”

The 3.5% pay raise for all county employees will cost $274,707.

County Manager Phil Sutton says employee retention is a real problem because Habersham lags behind nearby communities when it comes to our overall pay scale, “We’re between 12% and 13% behind the market. It was okay when the economy was bad and we had a lot of unemployment. Now that unemployment is around 5%, we are having a hard time keeping people.”

911/EMA Director Lynn Smith agrees, “Our turnover is very high. It’s hard to get qualified people. Out of ten people that I hire, I might keep two.” Smith has employees sign a contract stating that they’ll stay with the department for 3 years or face a financial penalty. “Some are willing to pay the penalty to leave and go to other counties where they can make more money. I can’t compete.”

Leaders say they’d like to do more to increase employee pay but can’t with the current financial situation. “The economy needs to turn around a in a much bigger way for us,” Sutton says. “We need to really see more commercial and industrial development here before we see any growth in revenue in order to catch up at all.”

Higher Insurance Costs

Taxpayers will have to pony up $122,800 more to cover county workers insurance costs in 2016 while employees will face higher deductibles and out of pocket expenses.

The cost to taxpayers for providing 137 “Employee-Only Plans” and 68 “Employee + Family Plans” will jump by 8.5%, from about $1.4 million to more than $1.5 million, for the fiscal year beginning on July 1.

Finance Director Trey Wood says it could have been more, “We went into this expecting a 14-15% increase.” Wood and Sutton worked with the broker to lower the cost to taxpayers but the compromise will cost employees.

Currently, the county picks up 100% of the premium costs for employees and 60% of premiums for covered family members. In order to maintain that promise, county leaders will switch to a higher-deductible plan in 2016. The deductible for the single employee will go from $3000 to $3500 while the family deductible jumps from $9000 to $10,500. The maximum out-of-pocket expenses increase by $1600 for the individual and $3,200 for families.

All other benefits (Co-Pay, Emergency Room, Prescriptions) remain the same.

Employees who want to keep the current, lower-deductible/lower-maximum, plan can do so but the difference in cost will come out of their paycheck.

*In-Network      **Per Pay Period

Lower Tax Digest

Property values in Habersham County rose by $17 million but a reduction in the overall tax digest will mean less revenue for the county.

Now Habersham received a draft copy of the soon-to-be-released Tax Digest which lays out the value of all the property in Habersham County. These initial figures show the current total value of all “Real and Personal” property in the county is more than $1.2 billion, an increase of about $17 million over 2014.

“You can see some growth as you go through here,” Finance Director Wood points out. “That’s a good thing in my opinion.”

Unfortunately, for the county government, the taxable value of cars, trucks and other motor vehicles dropped by right at $20 million and the value of mobile homes dipped slightly. The drop in motor vehicle taxes is not unexpected. In 2013, Georgia shifted from yearly ad valorem taxes to a one-time “title tax” on cars and trucks. That line item of the digest has dropped every year since.

Wood stresses that all these numbers are just a draft of the official digest, “They (Tax Commissioner and Tax Assessor) are still tweaking some of the numbers so it could adjust a little bit.” We expect to see a final version before the end of the month.

The draft digest suggests the county government will likely have less to spend in 2016. While real estate values trended higher, once you include homestead and other exemptions, the county expects to collect $105 thousand less in 2016 than they did this year.

Millage Rate Remains Steady

Habersham County Commissioners won’t increase the millage rate (10.785) so they’ll have to get by on about 1% less in property tax revenue. That’s not a surprise to Wood. His office developed the new 2016 county budget very conservatively, projecting no growth in property tax revenue at all.

Have Your Say

The budget must be in place by July 1. The Habersham County Board of Commissioners will conduct a second Public Hearing for the FY2015-2016 Budget on Monday June 22 at 6:00 pm in the Jury Assembly Room at the Courthouse in Clarkesville. They are expected to vote on the plan at that meeting.

You can get copies of the proposed Budget in the Commission office located inside the old courthouse in downtown Clarkesville and there is a summary available on the Habersham County website.

Downed trees and limbs blocked roads in the Soque Falls subdivision after a powerful storm swept through Thursday night. Jasper Lee (shown here) and his wife Delene photographed the storm’s aftermath.

We don’t know just how much it will cost the City of Cornelia’s insurance company yet but, according to court documents, the family of Bounkham Phonesavanh has dismissed the lawsuit against the city after reaching a settlement this week.

Phonesavanh, now two years old, is still recovering from burns and lacerations to his face and chest suffered when a flash grenade was thrown into a house on Lakeview Heights Circle in Cornelia last year. Officers from a regional drug task force were executing a no-knock search warrant at the time.

In February, Phonesavanh’s parents filed suit against the City of Cornelia and all the other local governments involved in the Regional Narcotics Investigation and Suppression team.

In a motion filed this week, the Phonesavanh’s attorney, Richard Hendrix, asked that Judge Robert Story dismiss the lawsuit against the City of Cornelia and the city’s insurer because “…an amicable settlement and compromise has been reached relative to the underlying dispute involved in this case, the case can now be dismissed with prejudice.”

Matching requests for dismissal were entered by the Georgia Interlocal Risk Management Agency (GIRMA) which is the city of Cornelia’s liability insurer and the city’s attorney Steve Campbell.

The clerk at the United States District Court for the Northern District of Georgia marked the case “Terminated” on Thursday afternoon.

As part of the settlement the Phonesavanh’s attorney also made a motion to remove Cornelia Police officer Paul Cheseboro and Assistant Chief Jonathan Roberts from a separate civil rights lawsuit stemming from the same May 2014 raid.

According to that document the other defendants, including Habersham Sheriff Joey Terrell, remain targets of the Phonesavanh’s civil rights suit.

The details and total amounts of the settlement with Cornelia have yet to be released but Now Habersham has learned that it includes a “stipulation that a trust will be created with a corporate fiduciary at a bank for the benefit of the minor child.”

That’s similar to the terms of the deal the Phonesavanhs struck with Habersham County’s insurance company in April. That agreement included a $964,000 settlement and a provision setting aside $200,000 in an annuity for Bounkham to be paid out directly to him in a series of 3 lump sum payments starting when he reaches age 18. The total value of those payments as scheduled would be $457,876 paid out over 15 years beginning in 2033.

An emailed request for comment from Cornelia City Attorney Steve Campbell was unanswered at the time of publication. We will bring you further details including how much GIRMA will have to pay the Phonesavanhs as soon as that information becomes available.

Life can change in an instant. Just ask the Payne family of Toccoa. Connie and Chuck Payne’s 12 year old son Conner is confined to a wheelchair. He requires constant care. It wasn’t always like this.

Just look at the photos of him on Facebook and you’ll see how quickly – how drastically – Conner’s life has changed. Not so long ago he was a happy, seemingly healthy young boy with a zest for life. The pictures tell the story of a kid who played music, played on the beach and smiled a lot. Oh, how he smiled.

His smile is gone now, replaced by the exhaustion and exasperation of a young boy’s spirit that is fighting hard to overcome being trapped inside his own body.

Conner was born with fluid on his brain – a condition called hydrocephalus. A shunt was used to drain the fluid but, over time, he began suffering severe pain and other symptoms. On February 10th of this year Conner’s shunt failed. He suffered traumatic brain injury. His mom found him unresponsive and administered CPR. Conner was life-flighted to Scottish Rite Children’s Hospital in Atlanta and that’s where he stayed for 87 days. His parents took turns staying with him in Atlanta and with his younger sister at home.

Conner returned home in early May. His mom gave up her job. Now she takes care of him full time and says, “He’s like a 12 year-old baby.”

The physical challenge of caring for Conner is hard but the financial strain is exacting an even bigger toll. The travel expenses to and from Atlanta during Conner’s hospital stay added up and now the Paynes are buried under mounting medical bills. With just one wage earner in the family it’s tough to make ends meet. That’s why Connie and Chuck are so grateful for the help they’ve received from the local community.

The family lives in Toccoa and attends church in Mt. Airy. Welcome Home Baptist recently held a large yard sale and sold meals and baked goods. Young people, men and women were involved in the event. The weather was sunny and Connie says the sales went “tremendously well.” The fundraiser helped the Paynes with some of their expenses, but more expenses remain.

On Saturday, June 20, another fundraiser will be held, this time at Mega Motorsports in Toccoa. The business is sponsoring a motorcycle ride from Toccoa to South Carolina. The cost is $15 per motorcyclist or $25 per couple. The ride starts at 10:30 a.m. at Mega Motorsports on GA 17 Alternate in Toccoa and will follow a scenic route to Chau Ram Park in Westminster, SC. Hot dog plates will be sold at the park for $6 and $2 raffle tickets will be sold for prizes. You can register by calling Shawn Westmoreland of Mega Motorsports at 706-244-3170 or Chris Lawson at 706-968-5247.

If you can’t ride, you can still help.

Westmoreland accepts donations on behalf of the Paynes at Mega Motorsports and the North Georgia Credit Union in Toccoa has a donation account set up in Conner’s name. Donations and cards may also be mailed directly to the family at 337 Colston Drive, Toccoa, GA  30577.

It’s been a long journey for the Paynes but they’re holding on to hope that Conner will recover. They’re living, working and praying for the day when his smile returns and life will once again change, this time for the better.

Conner’s Journey in pictures

For more on Conner Payne’s journey follow him on Facebook at Conner’s Miracle.