The Marietta Daily Journal – Cobb Chairman stiff arms Tea Party suggestions on Braves

MARIETTA — J.D. Van Brink, chairman of the Marietta-based Georgia Tea Party, is in for some bad news when he has lunch with county chairman Tim Lee on Thursday.

During a tea party meeting at the House of Lu on Monday, Van Brink said he planned to ask Lee for several revisions to the proposal to build a $672 million stadium for the Atlanta Braves when they meet Thursday.

Lee and Van Brink are regular lunch partners, meeting to discuss county issues.

“When you look at the things that are on the table, the things that the Georgia Tea Party is concerned (about) right off the bat, No. 1 is this roughly $8 million,” Van Brink told the group.

Van Brink is referring to Lee’s proposal to extend for an additional 30 years the parks bond taxes now due to expire in 2017 and 2018. Rather than lower the millage rate by .33 mills when those voter-approved parks bonds are paid off, Lee proposes keeping the millage on the books to pay for the stadium debt.

“It reminds us of the Georgia 400, right?” Van Brink said. “It’s a tax that’s only supposed to last for a certain amount of time and then all of a sudden it continues, you know? That adds to the distrust that people have in government. So we’d like to see what we can do about getting that $8 million changed.”

Another request Van Brink said he planned to make was to postpone the Nov. 26 vote.

“I can understand why you need to have negotiations like this in private and in secret, but once the deal becomes public then you do need public input and we do need to take some time to look at this,” Van Brink said.

Lee told the MDJ on Tuesday neither request would be granted.

“First of all, the .33 mills is what I need to make the deal happen financially, and I’m not postponing it; I wouldn’t gain anything by it,” Lee said. “You know the stats you put in your paper this morning, 98 percent of the people in Cobb County polled are aware of this project, so who in addition are we going to hear from? All the information is on our website.”

via The Marietta Daily Journal – Cobb Chairman stiff arms Tea Party suggestions on Braves.