Dawsonville — The Dawsonville City Council held a public hearing on the proposed fiscal year 2025–26 budget, a $23,004,067 package that staff plans to bring back for adoption on June 16.

Robin Gazzaway, the city's finance director, presented highlights of the proposed budget for the July 1, 2025–June 30, 2026 fiscal year and walked the council through summary comparisons to prior years. “I have put in here to do a 5% COLA,” Gazzaway said, and she told the council she built an 8% increase into the health insurance line because insurers had given widely varying renewal estimates.

Gazzaway said the city’s general fund is projected to increase about 9% from the prior year and that the overall budget total reflects larger enterprise and capital figures tied to water projects. She also noted the downtown development authority had not adopted its own budget at the time of the packet but staff used prior-year figures so the city would have an approved total to meet compliance requirements.

On special revenue funds, Gazzaway said the city’s T-SPLOST account currently shows roughly $392,000 available and that the city may temporarily borrow from the general fund to start projects that T‑SPLOST will later reimburse. She said anticipated new hires tied to a possible water treatment plant — for example, a treatment plant operator — are included in the budget so costs are not an unexpected addition if the plant proceeds.

There were no public speakers on the budget during the hearing. The public hearing was opened by a motion from Council member Mark French, seconded by Council member Caleb Phillips, and later closed by motion of Council member Eells, seconded by Council member Sandy Sawyer. The council closed the hearing with no public comment and will consider final adoption at its June 16 meeting.

Gazzaway told the council the complete budget packet is detailed and that staff can provide additional line-item detail on request; she said the full packet runs several hundred pages and that staff can print further detail upon council request.

Ending: The council will take a final vote on the fiscal 2025–26 budget at its June 16 meeting; staff said it will provide requested budget detail to council members before that session.