Peachtree City Mayor Don Haddix has been elected to be Fayette County’s representative on a group that will decide which regional transportation projects should be pursued for funding through a proposed 10-year region-wide special purpose local option sales tax (SPLOST).
Only regional transportation projects will be eligible for the funding, Haddix said in an interview Wednesday. That means the projects must serve two or more jurisdictions to be considered for the SPLOST project list.
The focus will be on transportation improvements for corridors that move people between Fayette County and metro Atlanta, Haddix said.
Haddix said he will seek input on the projects from the mayors of each municipality in Fayette County along with the county commission.
The “transportation roundtable” group that Haddix will work with is responsible for developing an initial SPLOST project list and then refining a list of regional transportation projects that will be proposed by state officials.
“We’re talking about a lot of money and a lot of impact,” Haddix said.
Money for the projects will be contingent upon voter approval in a referendum in July 2012.
In that referendum, as long as the SPLOST is approved by a majority of voters in the entire region, Fayette and other counties will be forced to participate in the SPLOST even if the entire county votes the initiative down.
Any potential regional project with Coweta won’t be eligible for the funding because Coweta and Fayette are in different regions, Haddix said.
Fayette is in the Atlanta Regional Commission while Coweta is part of the Three Rivers Regional Commission.
In addition to working through Haddix, Fayette’s municipalities and the county, along with state legislators, will be able to submit regional transportation projects for consideration by the state’s transportation planning director.
The final list of regional SPLOST projects to be voted on will be finished by an executive committee of the regional roundtable.
The regional transportation SPLOST initiative was a project from Gov. Sonny Perdue and was approved by the legislature earlier this year.
