DeKalb FAB recommends budget amendments, advances housing bond plan pending millage vote
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Summary
The Finance, Audit & Budget Committee approved several departmental staffing and program amendments and advanced a proposed housing investment tied to a half‑mill increase that officials say would support bond issuance to fund housing production and services; the bond and its revenue rely on a separate millage vote this summer.
DeKalb County’s Finance, Audit & Budget Committee on a special call approved a set of budget amendments and heard detailed presentations on a proposed housing investment program that officials said would be financed in part by a half‑mill increase.
At the outset the committee approved minutes and two contract items (a renewal for police ammunition and a change order for prosecutor case‑management software). The primary policy debate centered on an amendment the CEO’s office proposed to create a recurring annual housing allocation and to enable issuance of a housing investment bond the administration expects to pair with state and private capital.
Chief housing officer Dr. Alan Ferguson told commissioners the plan begins with an annual allocation that would ramp to $12 million–$15 million and that the county would issue bonds to catalyze a much larger amount of private and public investment. “We’re going to issue bonds that will generate somewhere in the neighborhood around a $155,000,000 in proceeds,” Ferguson said; he added the administration expects those funds to be used with leveraged capital to produce and preserve housing and estimated the program could help produce or preserve more than 10,000 units over an eight‑to‑ten‑year period. The administration said the bond proceeds and related programs would be rolled out over several years, with programmatic spending and governance details coming back to committees for review.
Commissioners pressed on the program’s dependency on a millage increase. Zach (administration) and budget director TJ said the operating budget being considered assumes the half‑mill rate increase; if the board adopts the budget but the millage increase fails in July, the administration said it would use reserves in 2026 to sustain the planned spending level but could not sustain that level in later years without the new revenue. “If we do not get a millage rate increase, we will not be able to sustain that level of spending in out years,” Zach said.
Several commissioners supported the initiative while urging specificity on governance, transit integration and timing. Commissioner Robert Patrick and others asked how the bond issuance would affect the county’s overall bonding capacity; staff and the county CFO said the county retains capacity but that debt service and detailed cash‑flow modeling will be required before bonds are sold. Officials said further presentations will come to the appropriate standing committees to solicit public input and vendor proposals.
The committee adopted budget amendments to add: four Clerk of Superior Court positions (Clerk Deborah Deberry requested the positions be rolled into the operating budget after COVID grant funds ended), a DA supplemental staffing allocation, and an earmarked subline to continue and expand the Fresh on Deck mobile market. The committee recommended those amendments to the full Board of Commissioners.
Next steps: the committee’s recommendation advances to the full board; the housing bond would require further approvals and—critically—a separate millage‑rate vote in July to create the pledged revenue stream required for bond financing.
