Funding the Trails

Participants were asked to give their first, second, and third choices among several different funding options to create and maintain the trails and greenways in Oconee County. The options given were user fees; issuing bonds; license, permit, and utility fees; county sales tax; hospitality & accommodations tax; property tax increase; and capital projects tax.

The clear favorite was using hospitality & accommodations taxes for this purpose. Unsurprisingly, people were not in favor of raising property taxes. Here are the rankings, in order of most votes received:

• Hospitality & accommodations tax: 50 (1st choice—45, 2nd choice—5, 3rd choice—0)
• County sales tax: 36 (1st choice—2, 2nd choice—30, 3rd choice—4)
• Issuing bonds: 33 (1st choice—7, 2nd choice—7, 3rd choice—19)
• Capital projects tax: 12 (1st choice—0, 2nd choice—4, 3rd choice—8)
• License, permit, & utility fees: 10 (1st choice—1, 2nd choice—0, 3rd choice—9)
• User fees: 8 (1st choice—0, 2nd choice—3, 3rd choice—5)
• Property tax increase: 7 (1st choice—1, 2nd choice—2, 3rd choice—4)