Columbus council members and Lowndes County supervisors met Tuesday for a joint session focused on improving communication between the two boards and identifying ways the city and county can work more closely together.
It was the first joint meeting of the boards since the COVID-19 pandemic, Board of Supervisors President Trip Hairston told The Dispatch, and officials on both sides said they hope it marks the beginning of more regular dialogue.
“We are not adversaries. We all serve the same people. … The ability to walk over to City Hall and y’all walk over here to say, ‘Look, we’ve got an issue that we need some help with’ or just to talk – I promise you, just makes for a good political climate. It makes for a good team moving forward,” District 5 Supervisor Leroy Brooks said. “That doesn’t mean we always have to agree on different issues, but the reality is, we serve the same people. And when people perceive that we’re not working together, it weakens all of us.”
Brooks pointed to ongoing joint projects, like the improvements of Fifth Street North currently underway and efforts to improve drainage at Sim Scott Park, as examples of what coordinated efforts between the boards can accomplish.
The city and county currently maintain several interlocal and mutual-aid agreements, ranging from operating the Columbus-Lowndes County Airport and the Lowndes County Adult Detention Center to sharing a tax assessor/collector and a joint shooting range, among others.
Brooks said it’s important for members of both boards to communicate with each other both to sustain those efforts and pursue new ones.
“More important than just to be able to come in and fix a road or host a tournament together, I think the most important thing is dialogue,” Brooks said. “That’s really important, that we understand that we have the ability to talk to one another about different issues.”
Hairston noted the city and county’s strong record of collaborating to provide tax incentives to developments in Columbus, including the rehabilitation of the former Leigh Mall property and the addition of Rural King to the retail corridor on Highway 45.
Building on that discussion, Jason Spears, councilman for Ward 6, said the county is experienced at coordinating incentives for industrial developments. A similar approach to retail recruitment could benefit both governments, he said.
“I’m sure that you’re all preseasoned when it comes to when you’re meeting with industries (for) these big projects across the river – you already have a lot of the infrastructure field (finished), then you just snap in some of the pieces you need to actually bring that to the table,” Spears said.
Spears said it would be “forward thinking” to identify priority areas in Columbus – such as East Columbus, along Highway 45 or downtown – and establish a template to market sites to developers.
“Then once we do have someone coming to the table, we can go to a potential investor that’s looking at investing in the city and say, ‘You know what, we’ve already got 60% of this put together. Tell us what you really need for some of these deals to materialize,’” Spears said. “Then it’s a lot quicker (of a) turnover than just coming to the table with a blank piece of paper and starting drawing it out from there.
“I think all of us understand that math a little bit better than most,” he added. “So I would say that would be something that I know would really help inside the city with all the economic activity that’s already going on around the city.”
District 4 Supervisor Jeff Smith said moving forward, both boards should consider holding more joint meetings to ensure smooth collaborations moving forward.
“There needs to be an effort to do at least one of these a year,” Smith said. “… I think it’s important that we do maintain a dialogue. There’s things that are happening in the city that we’re only aware of when we read about it in the paper that are important to all of us.”
Mayor Stephen Jones expressed support for working alongside the county, especially when that means using taxpayer funds more efficiently.
“There’s no need in us doing something (alone) that we could do together,” Jones told The Dispatch after the meeting. “If it’s going to be less for the citizens, then why spend the citizens’ money separate doing something that we could come together to do and save the citizens’ money?”
McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.
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