Hamilton County commissioners approved two resolutions Wednesday that broke new ground for county government, despite tension between some commissioners and the county mayor’s office.
A $260 million bond issue, which Hamilton County Schools Superintendent Justin Robertson has called “the most aggressive step toward facilities in the history of the joint school system,” passed unanimously. The bond is the largest in county history.
“We are going to have to be really frugal with government spending to make sure we are taking care of our debt service over the next few years while not impacting services,” Commission Chair Jeff Eversole, R-Ooltewah, said by phone.
The county traditionally limited bonds to 15 years, but the new bonds will likely be for 20 years, Lee Brouner, the county’s finance director, told commissioners Wednesday morning. The interest payments are estimated to be $112 million in total, he said.
“We are still looking at the time frame in which we would pay off the debt,” Mary Francis Hoots, director of communications for county Mayor Weston Wamp, said by text.
Twenty years is commonplace across Tennessee, Hoots said.
Elected officials have put off funding school facilities needs for years. An expert study several years ago showed the school system had reached a facilities crisis. Students have publicly pleaded with commissioners to address deteriorating conditions in some schools, but many county leaders pushed for further study, arguing there were differences between what schools wanted and needed.
A list of school projects, expected to be prioritized with the long-awaited money, was presented to commissioners last week by Robertson and Wamp and included the new North River Elementary, slated to receive $42 million.
The Gateway school will receive $40 million; Soddy Daisy Middle will receive between $25 million and $30 million; Brainerd/Dalewood 6-12 will receive $25 million to $30 million; Clifton Hills Elementary will receive $10 million to $20 million; and Thrasher Elementary will receive $5 million, according to documents given to commissioners.
Deferred maintenance, the highest line item on the proposed projects to be funded by the bond, will receive $60 million.
Still, both Wamp and Robertson have acknowledged the numbers and priorities could change.
Plans for the previous bond issue “shifted dramatically” before the money was spent, Robertson told commissioners last week. Not all the projects will get done with the latest bond issue, he said.
“There is some risk in outline,” Wamp told commissioners last week. “People will try to hold us to these numbers.”
The county commission will still have to approve how every future dollar of bond revenue is spent.
If projects get further delayed, they will cost more later, some commissioners pointed out Wednesday.
Brouner told Commissioner Warren Mackey, D-Chattanooga, that the delayed Tyner school project originally cost $76 million but is closer to $100 million now.
“Putting Band-Aids on. Is there a cost associated with that?” Mackey asked Brouner.
“If the world works the way it has for the past 100 years,” Brouner answered.
BUSINESS CENTER
Some commissioners voiced concern, too, about giving the county’s economic development staff permanent space in the county owned Small Business Development Center, before unanimously approving a lease including two office spaces for county employees.
Eversole said he didn’t want to see county employees take up space that could help a local small business grow.
“We don’t take it. We let them take it,” Eversole said during the meeting. “They turn into a lot more tax revenue than us taking the space.”
“I just want to know what it is that we are providing to enhance the experience of small business?” Commissioner David Sharpe, D-Red Bank, asked the mayor’s staff.
“We believe it is important to be connected as partners,” Cory Gearrin, the county’s deputy mayor over economic development, said.
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In 2022 Wamp told the Chattanooga Times Free Press he created Gearrin’s job because he believed the county needed a “chief salesperson” to help attract businesses and grow talent.
Former county Mayor Jim Coppinger, who worked closely with the Chattanooga Area Chamber of Commerce, did not employ an economic development staff.
The chamber has been leasing the county building for two decades, but Wamp said the lease had expired and that he wants the county to move toward “partnership, rather than a landlord position.”
“It would be very valuable to the private sector for redevelopment,” Wamp told Commissioners. “We want it to serve entrepreneurial growth.”
Contact Joan McClane at jmcclane@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6601.