Meeting Time: January 28, 2026 at 7:00pm EST
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Agenda Item

5) Citizen Comments – For agenda items that are not the subject of a Public Hearing

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    JEFF MILBURN 2 months ago

    Dear FC BOS,

    I am following up on my Jan. 12th email titled: Has the City & County finally met at the crossroads that include several open forums, screenshots and link to the Final Unification Steering Committee Report (189 pages) from April 4, 2008.

    https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rl7hbAfkCa3OSFOf9r1g5HvxtKZ9YrOG/view?usp=sharing

    Has the City and County finally arrived at the crossroads now for unification? The city folks don't want a casino and county folks don't want data centers. But how are the revenue requirements going to be met without raising our taxes?

    Is duplication of public services economically beneficial to an entire community? Is this an opportunity to revisit unification?

    To remind everyone, back in January of 2009, Mike Foreman (Handley grad, former City Clerk of Court) stated that the steering committee unanimously called for unification of the two local communities. There were 10 sub-committees that were composed of members from both city and county and they all were in favor of consolidation. This is a perfect example of an unbiased study and recommendation but for whatever unknown reason(s), the perception is that our elected officials from both sides appeared to have been the roadblock.

    Bottom line, there was an unbiased study over a couple of years between city and county residents that made the recommendation of moving forward with unification. That report cannot be disputed whatsoever. Why was all that time wasted for nothing?

    Again, I must reference Wayde Byard's open forums from 2010 ... Aug. 2010, Open Forum: 10-80-10, Give '80' a chance to make informed choice on unification and May 2020, Open Forum: City, county should reexamine consolidation, Crisis creates opportunity ... is Wayde wrong?

    To close, has the City and County finally met at the crossroads that consolidation needs to be revisited? What is best for our entire community?

    Respectfully,
    JEFF