Milledgeville and Baldwin County Still Considering Consolidation

MILLEDGEVILLE, Georgia (41NBC/WMGT) – Residents of the Baldwin County area voiced some strong opinions at the Board of Commissioners meeting tonight.

The conversation began months ago, as a committee of citizens was formed to create a new government.

Now, that proposal is coming to a vote very soon.

It’s a trend that’s slowly growing.

Recently, the city of Macon and Bibb County have consolidated.

And now, Baldwin County and Milledgeville are considering becoming part of the trend.

“The people I speak with–they’re behind it,” said Commissioner John Westmoreland. “But then, you come to meetings like this, and you see people that are not behind it.”

The Baldwin County Board of Commissioners met Tuesday night and took comments from the public on the latest proposed plan to unify governments.

“And I want to make sure to present the point that I support and the groups that I represent as a community leader supports increasing employment issue, lowering taxes, and also to do anything to better our area,” said Democratic Party of Baldwin County Chairman Quentin T. Howell. “But unfortunately, this consolidation, as it’s written right now, does neither(sic) of the three.”

Quentin T. Howell, the Chairman of the Democratic Party of Baldwin County, says the document has major flaws that cannot be easily fixed.

“Unfortunately it puts the county into debt for the next 10 or 12 years,” said Howell. “It has an additional tax under section seven called a franchise fee that county residents don’t pay now, but will pay later, and it also has poor representation through the community in it.”

Commissioner John H. Westmoreland says even with those concerns, he supports putting the plan to a vote after just a few more changes.

“We’re gonna try to get the best document we can available to the community to read and go through. We’ve asked for input from the community, we’ve received very little. But there are a couple of changes that need to be made, we’ll make those changes, and then we’ll present the revised document one more time to the community and then we’re gonna have an up or down vote.”

Westmoreland said on Wednesday, they would continue discussions between the county and city governments.

They’ll look at the document, make more changes and go from there.

If it does make it to a ballot, residents in both Baldwin County and Milledgeville will have to pass consolidation for it to happen.