DeKalb committee reviews value-capture options to help fund MARTA's proposed Buford Highway rapid-transit line

DeKalb County commissioners on March 26 heard a presentation from KB Advisory Group on local financing options that could help pay for MARTA's planned arterial rapid transit (ART) on Buford Highway.

Jeff Ksky, president of KB Advisory Group, told the Public Works & Infrastructure Committee the study focused on "value capture"'using future increases in property and sales tax revenue tied to improved transit to help finance construction and potentially operations. Ksky said MARTA's ART plan on Buford Highway is under active planning (about 30% design on MARTA's site) but that funding remains the primary obstacle.

Ksky said his team analyzed roughly 56,000 parcels within a mile of the corridor with a current aggregate tax-appraised value of about $19 billion and ran scenarios for several local tools. "At its highest estimate," he said, "maybe this is a billion dollars on the table over 20 years," adding that such an outcome assumes stacking multiple local tools and favorable market responses. He cautioned that the realistic scale is smaller and that capturing money up front would require borrowing against growth that accrues slowly: "Only 9% of these values come in the first five years of that 20-year buildout."

Why it matters: Even optimistic local scenarios would likely be only one layer in a "layer cake" of funding that would include federal grants and state or regional sources. Commissioners stressed that funding scenarios should follow an understanding of mode, not the reverse: determine what value capture is available for a corridor and then pick modes and phasing that fit that funding profile.

Discussion and points of contention

- TAD/TIF: Ksky identified tax-allocation districts (TADs; called TIF in other states) as the single largest local source in the model but noted legal and practical limits. He said much of the captured increment reflects expected background growth and that a TAD would be a long-term play that yields most revenue later in a 20-year window. "TAD is a long-term project," he said, noting the backloaded revenue profile.

- Sales tax options: Ksky ran hypothetical sales-tax-capture scenarios (sometimes called "sales tax TAD" in the analysis) and said such a tool does not currently exist in Georgia; a countywide sales-tax increase would raise far more local revenue but would be politically sensitive and would require state and regional coordination.

- Mode tradeoffs: Commissioners debated the relative merits of BRT/ART, light rail and emerging autonomous-vehicle (AV) approaches. Commissioner Terry observed the county might be "operating with a 20th-century transit mindset" and asked whether lower-cost AV or microtransit options were now worthy of study; Ksky cautioned that rail tends to attract more private investment and serve more people reliably, while others noted the high capital and operating costs of heavy modes and urged piloting lower-cost alternatives in other corridors.

- Replication and next steps: Commissioners asked the county to replicate the KB Advisory template for other corridors (Clifton Corridor, Memorial Drive) so decisions about mode and funding can be better matched to local value-capture potential. Ksky said he would provide the full report and follow up on corridor length and other requested details.

Attribution: Quotes and attributions in this article come from the committee meeting transcript: Jeff Ksky (KB Advisory Group, presenter), Commissioner Robert Patrick (committee chair), and Commissioner Terry (questioning). Other commissioners contributed to the dialog. No formal vote or ordinance resulted from this presentation; commissioners directed staff to pursue follow-up briefings and to distribute the consultant's final report.

What happens next: Commissioners asked staff to replicate the funding analysis for additional corridors and to return with scenario runs (20- and 40-year TAD variants were discussed) and more precise cost and corridor-length figures. The committee did not adopt any change to county law during the meeting.