Tax abatements, digitizing older probate records
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Food for Thought
Judge of Probate Richard Dean
The primary runoff election was held on April 16. There was one office on the ballot, Coosa County circuit clerk. Congratulations to Jamey Johnson. Christa has all the details from the runoff in this edition, so I will not repeat that information. She does a much better job with the coverage than I do anyway.
If you cast a vote in the runoff, thank you. And a special thank you to all the candidates who were willing to place their names on the ballot to be our next Coosa County circuit clerk. Now, as concerned citizens and voters, we ALL need to begin our homework to decide for whom we will cast our votes in the November 5, 2024, General Election, which is also a presidential election.
Moving on to a new topic. Some have approached me regarding tax abatements the Coosa County Commission supported to bring businesses into Coosa County. A few people have really been upset that our County Commission supported proposed tax abatements for businesses locating to or located in Coosa County. Some are very adamant there should be no abatements or incentives provided to a business to build facilities and/or place equipment in Coosa County.
As a member of the Lake Martin Area Economic Development Alliance (LMAEDA) Board of Directors, I see firsthand the need and understand why the county must offer abatements. Most often the business prospects looking in our area are also looking at other areas to possibly locate their businesses. More often than not, they are looking at multiple counties and at multiple states.
In many instances, these other areas/counties/states are not only offering tax abatements; they are also offering construction incentives and/or providing the land at no charge. Occasionally they will even provide the building. If Coosa County doesn’t offer any tax abatements, then the businesses will go somewhere else, and that is the end of discussions.
Some people argue when tax abatements are offered, the county gets nothing from the business. That is not true. While the county general fund may not receive tax revenue, the Coosa County schools do. School taxes cannot be abated. The Coosa County schools and the Alabama school program normally begin receiving tax revenue when the business starts improving the land, erecting their buildings, or installing new equipment.
For example, in 2023, while the Coosa County Commission gave up their tax revenue for businesses to locate or expand in Coosa County, our Coosa County schools received an additional $77,477 in tax revenue that otherwise it would not have received. The state school revenue was $42,421 that otherwise would not have been received. That is $119,898 the school system would not have received had it not been for the Coosa County Commission providing these companies the tax abatements.
Frequently the Coosa County Commission is bashed for not doing more to support the school system. I believe the County Commission, by abating tax revenue that would go to the county general fund, is supporting the school system. The Commission forfeiting revenue to bring businesses to the county enables the school system to collect the above listed revenue, in addition to the other taxes collected and disbursed to the school, is showing outstanding support for our schools and for our children.
In addition, without businesses, there are no jobs. Without jobs, there is no reason for our graduating students to remain in or come back to Coosa County. While it is true that all the jobs do not go to Coosa County residents, many of the jobs do. If the jobs are here, Coosa County residents can apply for the jobs. The other side of that is; if the jobs aren’t here, our citizens cannot apply.
For those employees in Coosa County who are not residents, hopefully they are spending some of the money earned in Coosa County by supporting other Coosa County businesses and contributing to Coosa County through the sales tax collected. Maybe they will even decide to move to or purchase/build a home in Coosa County. If they have children, maybe their children will go to our Coosa County schools and increase the student population.
Some believe tax abatements run forever. That is not the case. Tax abatements can run for 20 years. However, Coosa County normally limits abatements to 10 years. For the recent tax abatements given, the LMAEDA and Coosa County Commission established hiring quotas and minimum salary requirements which the businesses must meet. If the company doesn’t meet the hiring quotas or salary requirements, the tax abatements are decreased or may end entirely.
Now on to some great news! At least in my opinion. The Coosa County probate records stored in our records room will finally be scanned, digitized, enhanced, and loaded on our computer system. If you have visited our records room, you know some older records are in very bad condition. The paper is disintegrating, and many have pieces of the text missing. That leaves us, researchers and abstractors to only speculate what might have been on that missing section of the record.
While this project will not replace the missing text, at least it will capture and digitize all 186,000 pages of the records from 1832 to 1998. Furthermore, it will prevent further loss of information and preserve historical facts in the event of a natural disaster.
The digital records will be backed up offsite at multiple locations, on our computers and on external hard drives stored in our vault. In addition to digitizing these records, we wanted to preserve some original records that have special significance. However, because of the costs associated with preservation, we had to remove preservation from this project. We believed it was better to digitize all the paper records so future generations could at least see those records on computer and have an accurate history of what is in the records.
The downside of this project is the probate records room will be closed for regular research on all records prior to 1999 for a period of time. Records from 1999 forward will still be available in paper form and are on our computer system. The records room closed (only for records research involving records prior to 1999) on April 17 at 8 a.m. We will publicize when the room is reopened to the public.
This digitization project was made possible through the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds Coosa County received. Because the deadline for spending these funds is December 31, we are on a very tight schedule to get this project accomplished. We signed the agreement on March 29, and only last week, after multiple meetings with the digitization company’s representatives, ironed out all the details to begin the project.
The Code of Alabama requires the judge of probate to notify the county commission regarding the condition of records. It is then up to the county commission to provide funding for those records. While our County Commission provided funds to create new records and maintain records from 1999 to date, there was little funding available to copy and rebind records. There were no funds available for digitizing and archival of older records.
When the ARPA funds became available, the Coosa County Commission allocated a significant amount of those funds to make this project happen. It has taken a while for us to get federal approval and then to work through the bid process, but we have begun the project.
I hope you appreciate the project, the Coosa County Commission’s assistance and all the work my staff has done to get to this point. I appreciate it more than I can say. Now the real work begins. Thank you for your patience and understanding if you use our records room. We regret any inconvenience this may cause anyone, but please keep in mind this was desperately needed. This is a one-time opportunity for Coosa County.
Until next month, stay safe and God bless.
