South Fulton holds millage-cap hearing as officials prepare $96 million bond for public safety buildings

City of South Fulton officials opened a public hearing Aug. 12 on whether to remove or raise the city’s statutory millage-rate cap as staff and the city’s financial adviser outlined plans to borrow roughly $96 million to help pay for new police and fire headquarters and a training facility. The city manager and finance team said the city’s proposed fiscal 2026 budget already includes the first year of debt service tied to those projects and no millage-rate increase is proposed for 2025.

Why it matters: a millage-rate cap set in the city charter limits the legal tax rate the city may levy and is part of what bond investors examine when pricing municipal debt. Financial adviser Ed Wall and bond counsel told the council that, with the current cap in place, investors see limited collateral capacity; removing the cap or raising it to a higher ceiling would make the city’s debt look stronger to lenders and could yield lower long‑term borrowing costs.

At t…