Andre Dickens to ACP: City tax increase likely within the next few years

The City of Atlanta is facing a budget crunch, and it likely will need to pass a property tax increase within the next several years to be able to provide ongoing services to a growing population.

That was part of the message Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens shared with the influential Atlanta Committee for Progress at its quarterly board meeting on Friday morning at the offices of the King & Spalding law firm.

The ACP is a private organization that works in concert with the City of Atlanta and is made up of Atlanta’s top business and civic leaders.

Dickens sat down for an exclusive interview after the meeting to go over the topics that were discussed. He also answered questions about MARTA and the tree ordinance.

The “bulk” of the meeting centered around the city’s revenue challenges, given that its population is expected to grow by 200,000 people in the next 20 years. The city’s population is now about 515,000 — up from about 400,000 in the late 1990s. The mayor said the city’s population “swells” in the daytime and on weekends, sometimes doubling or more.

“We want ACP to look long term — they are business members. They are very satisfied with where we are, operationally as a city,” Dickens said. “This has been hard work. Using the current business model of the city, it’s not sustainable to have a city with high growth in people, high expectations by the people, but a cost structure from a 1999 model.”

Peter Aman, Atlanta’s chief strategy officer, said on an inflation-adjusted, per-capita basis, the city’s revenues are down since 1999. Also, the city’s gross domestic product has grown during that time, but revenues have remained relatively flat.

The last time the city passed a property millage rate hike (when it increased by three mills) was in 2009, the last year of Mayor Shirley Franklin’s administration. The city’s proposed millage rate for the next fiscal year is 11.37 percent. A mill represents the amount of tax per $1,000 of assessed property value.

“I can’t see a scenario where four more years go by without a millage rate increase of some portion,” said Dickens, who is running for re-election. If he is “blessed” to be mayor for the next four years, Dickens said the city will need to pass a tax increase to pay for salary hikes and the growing demand for city services.

“I don’t know if it’s this year or next year, but within four years, it will happen,” Dickens said of a probable city tax increase. “For last year’s budget, we said no to a millage rate increase. And we’ve said ‘no’ since 2009. We haven’t charged more for the services, and we have done magical work with budgets. While I don’t foresee it today, I know this will not last my whole next four years. I can’t see a scenario where four more years go by without a milage rate increase of some portion.”

The mayor also said the city is facing challenges given the current presidential administration.

“We can’t count on the federal government for the next three or four years with reliability,” he said. “We can’t depend on them for any kind of capital projects. We’ve seen that it is questionable at best. So, we’ve got to get it from the state, the county or the taxpayer. And we think that it’s a hodgepodge, a mix of all three.”

The needs include both “physical” and “social” infrastructure, the mayor said, adding that includes housing for the unhoused, mental health provisions, youth services, senior services and workforce development, among other needs.

Dickens ty also gave ACP members a briefing about the city’s public safety successes, summer youth employment and preparations for the World Cup. He added the 2025 Club World Cup matches have been going well. He expects the next ACP meeting in September will focus on the World Cup.

At the December 2024 ACP meeting, the focus was on MARTA. Dickens and the administration said MARTA was going to be a priority for ACP in the coming year.

When asked about MARTA during the Friday interview, the mayor said fixing the transit agency is still a priority.

“We’re seeing a groundswell of people, businesses and organizations that are dissatisfied with MARTA,” Dickens said. “The project delivery is not meeting expectations of time, nor the budget. Ridership is decreasing.”

At the same time, there’s an increase in population both in the city and the region.

“We talked about how many people are in our region and in our city and how many more riders there could be, but they’re not choosing MARTA,” Dickens said. “That’s a problem.”

The mayor added MARTA users are also complaining that they can’t depend on MARTA because of long wait times. 

The mayor added that even MARTA’s own “key performance indicators” on its website show that the transit agency is falling short of providing reliable service.

“That’s very problematic for MARTA,” Dickens said. “The future of a growing city needs a world-class transit system that keeps up with the city’s growth. So, we are making demands about that.”

When asked about whether he envisions rail, the mayor said: “Yeah, we’ve got to build it out.”

Only four jurisdictions are part of MARTA: The City of Atlanta as well as Fulton, DeKalb and Clayton counties. When Clayton joined MARTA, it thought it would be getting a commuter rail line. But those plans have been scaled back to buses.

“There’s a whole region,” Dickens said. “MARTA has to perform at a level that would make the rest of the region think that transit is a good thing.”

The city recently passed a new tree ordinance — one that tree preservationists have criticized for not being strong enough to protect the city’s tree canopy.

I asked the mayor if he was satisfied with the recently passed tree ordinance or if it still needs improvement — as many people have said.

“They’re saying the same thing. I’m saying. We’re not done yet,” Dickens said, adding that tree preservation standards would be included with a new zoning ordinance. “You can’t do the preservation work without the land-use work that goes along with the zoning rewrite, which is underway that should be completed by the end of the year.”

The mayor did express frustration about how his position has been misrepresented.

“I have to say the basic statement — the mayor also wants to preserve the tree canopy,” Dickens said. “Write that down.”

The first step was increasing the fees charged when people cut down trees, with leeway being given to affordable housing developments. And that’s just an interim step.

The following ACP board members attended the June 27 meeting: Yum Arnold, Matt Bronfman, Andrew Cathy, David Cummings, Reade Fahs, Christian Fischer, Kim Greene, Venessa Harrison, Doug Hertz, Donna Hyland, Paul Judge, Jenna Kelly, Rich McKay, Michael Russell (chair), Wendy Stewart, Alex Taylor and Jenna Kelly. Kathy Waller is the executive director of ACP.