CONYERS — City officials zeroed in on their focus for the coming year at last weekend’s annual retreat, which included choosing the transportation projects to be funded by the next sales tax referendum.

The current special purpose local option sales tax collection will end next month.

City officials will meet with Rockdale County officials within the next 30 days to come up with a joint resolution to help formulate the next SPLOST referendum for voters. Mayor Randy Mills explained the county technically has to be the entity to collect the tax.

SPLOST is a 1 percent sales tax; the current tax was approved to generate $99 million over six years of collection, which funded various county and city projects.

The city expects to receive $10 million from the next SPLOST referendum, which — if approved by the voters — will be collected over the next six years, explained Councilman Vince Evans. Evans is in charge of the city’s transportation committee and said the estimate is based on the current economic situation and collection figures.

The mayor and council discussed earmarking 65 percent of city SPLOST collections for transportation, 20 percent for greenspace and recreation and 15 percent for capital.

“We basically just took the pie and divided up percentages,” Mills said.

Mills and Evans acknowledged over half the SPLOST would be allocated to transportation projects and both explained it was a need in the city.

“That’s a constant we have right now, keeping the roads (maintained),” Mills said.
Evans added that city leadership wanted to put the public funds toward projects that will impact the most people.

“Transportation affects everybody,” Evans said.

Brad Sutton with the city’s Public Works and Transportation Department updated city leadership on transportation projects to be completed and the estimated costs.

Those projects included:

• Railroad Street widening — estimated at $990,000;

• Intersection improvements at Old Covington and Gees Mill Roads — estimated $929,751;

• Resurfacing — estimated $491,212;

• Intersection improvements at Sigman and Eastview roads — estimated $68,406;

• Parking improvements — estimated $600,000;

• Multi—use path from Olde Town to Career Academy — estimated $900,000;

• Resurfacing, drainage and sidewalks for Eastview Road — estimated $850,000;

• Intersection improvements at Sigman Road and Sarasota Parkway — estimated $840,000; and

• Capital — estimated $830,000.