It took two tries, twelve months apart, but voters in Habersham County last night approved a one-cent special local option sales tax to help fund a wide range of county and city projects. Unofficial results show the SPLOST VI referendum passed by a 58% to 42% margin. Raw vote totals (with some provisional ballots not yet included) show 5,557 voters cast ballots in favor of SPLOST VI while 4,076 cast ballots against it.
It was a hard won victory for SPLOST VI suppporters. A similar measure was defeated at the polls in last year’s off-year election.
Throughout this election cycle supporters, led by the SPLOST VI Committee and Habersham County Chamber of Commerce, heavily promoted the issue through a series of nine town hall meetings and public forums. SPLOST VI Committee Chairman Wade Rhodes said early on in the process the referendum’s success hinged on two things: trust and voter turnout. SPLOST supporters got both Tuesday.
Many Habersham County voters, leery of how previous SPLOST funds were handled by elected officials, were convinced to support the measure this time by the creation of a SPLOST Oversight Committee. The committee, comprised of six members of the local community from a variety of backgrounds, will monitor SPLOST VI revenue intake and disbursements. The committee will report back to the community twice a year through local media about how much tax revenue is raised and where that money is spent. In the end, voter turnout turned out not to be much of a concern. With the draw of a governor’s race and a hotly-contested U.S. Senate race on the ballot Habersham County voters turned out at the polls in droves. Habersham County posted a 50.63% voter turnout with 9,758 of the county’s 19,274 registered voters casting ballots.
Tuesday’s vote means the local sales tax in Habersham County will rise from its current 6% to 7% – that’s an extra penny on each dollar you spend. The tax will remain in effect for six years. It’s projected to raise $37.5 million to pay for a variety of county and city projects including a 20% pay down on hospital debt, road construction and repair, bridge upgrades and repair, expansion of the Habersham County landfill, construction of a fire station in Turnerville, completion of the county’s industrial park in Baldwin, the purchase and repair of emergency vehicles and various other projects aimed at public health and safety and economic development.
