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Hart County renews Archway contract; commissioners press for county job-description updates
Summary
The Hart County Board of Commissioners approved a $12,000 contribution as part of the county's participation in the Archway program and discussed using Archway and partner student projects to address county engineering and job-description needs.
The Hart County Board of Commissioners voted 5-0 on May 13 to renew the county's participation in the Archway partnership and approved the county's $12,000 contribution to the 2026 agreement.
Archway representatives described a year of listening sessions and projects including poverty task-force work, workforce initiatives, Alzheimer's work groups, a student engineering project that examined a possible new fire station, and an interlocal feasibility study for a centralized administration building. Archway staff said such pre-planned documents can help the county be competitive for grants.
Archway representatives asked for input and highlighted ongoing work: "We worked on listening sessions with the community to figure out where your priority areas lie," an Archway representative told the commission. Commissioners asked Archway about two county priorities in particular: an engineering study for the sheriff's station (Archway said May 31 is a deadline to submit engineering plans) and updating county job descriptions.
Archway told the board it had provided three vendor or contractor options to update job descriptions; commissioners discussed those options and figures during the meeting. One commissioner summarized the available figures as roughly $11,000, $17,000 and $24,000 depending on the scope; commissioners and staff also discussed the possibility of using university student projects, internships or regional partners such as GMRC (the Georgia Mountains Regional Commission) to lower cost.
Commissioner Brown made the motion to approve the county's portion of the Archway contract and Commissioner Teasley seconded. The board's share was described on the record as $12,000; the total partnership contributions stated at the meeting were: Hart County $12,000, City of Hartwell $12,000, Hart County Board of Education $12,000, Hart County Industrial Building Authority $5,000, Hart County Chamber of Commerce $4,000 and Hart Telephone Company $5,000. The motion carried 5-0.
Commissioners said they want Archway projects to deliver tangible items the county can use for grant applications and operations, and asked Archway and staff to pursue engineering documentation and options for updating job descriptions that the county can implement.
