Hamilton County Mayor Jim CoppingerThe recent Hamilton County Commission fracas over how to spend $900,000 for community capital needs ignited passionate defenses of district-level priorities from a body deprived of discretionary special project money this year.
Matters came to a head Wednesday when commission Chairman Chester Bankston and Commissioner Warren Mackey requested $500,000 to replace the Central High School/Brown Middle School track, located in Bankston’s district. The measure fell short of the five votes needed to pass, with a majority of commissioners abstaining and calling for their own districts to receive their fair share.
“We have to have more positive conversations up here in the public to continue to grow this county or we really are going to be in a compromising situation,” Mayor Jim Coppinger said at the end of a 30-minute verbal battle among commissioners.
For years the nine commissioners received $100,000 apiece each year to spend in their districts until the fiscal 2016 budget, when Coppinger cut the special project money. Six commissioners voted to get the money anyway, siphoning it from reserves and overriding the mayor’s veto when he tried to stop them. But commissioners made no fuss when the mayor left discretionary funds out of the 2017 budget.
Last week it came to light they actually put a verbal agreement in place after a budget workshop last spring that would let commissioners tap up to $900,000 of the county’s line of credit for capital bonds to fund major projects.
The one-time proposal offered commissioners a chance to once again spend money on schools, a few years after the state attorney general said general fund money – including discretionary funds – could not be spent on schools.
Since the commission is simply accessing Hamilton County’s line of credit, the proposal does not exist as a budget line item, Coppinger has said. There is no documentation of the plan.
Three commissioners have used the county credit line so far this year. Bankston asked for $3,400 to help pay for Ooltewah High School’s new athletic field striper in September. In October, Commissioner Sabrena Smedley swapped $25,000 of her district’s discretionary money for capital money to build restrooms at the East Hamilton Middle High School football field. Jim Fields asked for $150,000 to resurface the Red Bank High School track in November.
Coppinger on Wednesday urged commissioners to look jointly at the big picture, especially in regard to education and economic development, when determining how to spend the money.
“The sensible, reasonable part of this is that we look at this collectively, look at the county as a whole and not so much about how much gets spent in [a particular] district,” Coppinger said.
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Several commissioners felt $500,000 was far too much to spend on one district project. Several noted the Central High School track overhaul would leave little more than $220,000 for the rest of their districts unless they had more money coming next year.
Vice Chairman Greg Beck said he wanted to fix high school tracks at Tyner and Brainerd and expected those repairs might cost nearly as much as the Central High track makeover.
“I don’t see how it’s going to be equal opportunity unless we wait until next year or unless we agree on everybody getting in line,” Beck said.
Coppinger stood firm on the one-time nature of the $900,000 credit line access.
“Again, I caution the commission understand that – and I don’t want to go down that trail – that would be it,” Coppinger said. “So understand that. That is what we agreed upon during the budget process, but only that amount.”
Commissioner Greg Martin questioned the commission’s priorities and asked when it had turned into “the track commission.”
He also demanded Hixson High School, located in his distinct, be treated equally, citing its own track needs.
“I’m advocating for Hixson to not be treated like a stepsister – like Cinderella was – but as a full-blooded sister to Central, welcome at the table with all the blessings and grace that comes,” Martin said in a sermonlike cadence. “I am 1,000 percent behind my sister school Central; I just don’t want Hixson to be the stepsister.”
Smedley said if some schools would be called stepsisters, she felt like East Hamilton School was the Prodigal Son, the biblical figure who squandered his inherited wealth on sinful living and returned home to beg forgiveness.
“I’ll be in line for some things too, but I’m not really encouraged, after today, of getting those approved,” Commissioner Randy Fairbanks said. “Today, to me, was disheartening.”
Mackey urged his colleagues not to gridlock just because they can’t fund all their district needs in the same year.
“Even though [my district] may not get anything this year, I’m going to support this resolution and believe and trust that commissioners are going to come back next year and support my resolution,” Mackey said.
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However, there is no next year for commission-driven unbudgeted special spending, at least according to the credit line agreement between the mayor and the county commission.
On Friday, Coppinger said he would not put commissioner discretionary money in the 2018 budget proposal and did not anticipate repeating the credit line deal.
Instead, Coppinger has consistently asked commissioners to bring needs to him for consideration within the county’s budgeting process.
Commissioners already have shown they are willing to take special project money, and Coppinger that he’s willing to veto any such attempt.
Coppinger said such a contest ultimately could play out in court if taken to the extreme.
“I hope there would never be an occasion we would have to go to court, and I don’t anticipate it,” Coppinger said.
Contact staff writer Paul Leach at 423-757-6481 or pleach@timesfreepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @pleach_tfp.