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“We look forward to having an open dialogue with each municipality individually and as a group to once again plan for Richmond County’s success.” — Jeff Smart, chair of the Board of Commissioners
ROCKINGHAM — The Richmond County government and its municipalities have reached an agreement to resolve their 14-month dispute over the sales tax distribution, avoiding a lawsuit and helping to mitigate the financial fallout from the county’s decision in April 2020 to change to an ad valorem distribution method with no prior warning.
The agreement requires Rockingham and Hamlet to not file litigation against the county for breach of contract stemming from the change to ad valorem, while the county agrees to distribute a total of $728,910 among the municipalities for the 2020-2021 fiscal year and to amend its approved 2021-2022 budget to include the same payment for the new fiscal year.
Additionally, the agreement stipulates that the municipalities use these funds within their respective municipalities “in a manner to benefit all citizens of Richmond County,” though it’s unclear what this entails and how the county would enforce this. The county has also requested that the county and municipalities meet quarterly “to work toward better communication with each other and discussion of projects of mutual benefit,” though this portion is not a part of the agreement itself.
The distribution of the funds by the county for 2020-2021 and 2021-2022, as laid out in the agreement will be as follows:
• Rockingham — $252,070
• Hamlet — $240,234
• Ellerbe — $66,661
• Dobbins Heights — $76,103
• Hoffman — $63,572
• Norman — $30,270
Board of Commissioners Chairman Jeff Smart declined to comment on how the county arrived at the total amount distributed and how they determined how much each municipality would receive.
The county’s initial offer, submitted on May 24, was for just a one-time payment of the above amount in exchange for the cities ending their pursuit of legal action against the county, which the municipalities rejected. The municipalities’ counter was to give two options, neither of which included agreeing not to sue. In a letter from County Attorney Bill Webb to the municipalities’ legal counsel in the matter, T.C. Morphis, dated June 17, Webb called these two offers “a non-starter,” and outlined the now-approved offer.
The municipalities met Monday afternoon at Rockingham City Hall and arrived at a consensus to accept the terms of the county’s new offer. Five of the six municipalities signed the agreement Monday, and all of them will vote to approve it either before June 30 or at their monthly meeting in July, according to Rockingham City Manager Monty Crump. Hamlet has not yet signed the agreement, but they have called a special meeting for Thursday where they will sign it and forward it to the county by Friday, Crump added.
“The municipal meeting of all the Richmond County towns to consider the County’s latest sales tax settlement offer has concluded with a consensus decision to support ratifying the agreement,” Crump said in an email to Webb Monday afternoon.
County leaders expressed gratitude that the parties had reached an agreement.
“On behalf of the Richmond County Board of Commissioners and the Richmond County Administration, we are pleased that we all could arrive at an amicable settlement,” said Smart in a text Monday. “We look forward to having an open dialogue with each municipality individually and as a group to once again plan for Richmond County’s success.”
Vice Chairman Justin Dawkins, who was instrumental in arriving at the most recent offer to the municipalities, said he feels like “we are on the right path to move our county, as a whole, forward.”
“Since the beginning, I have been adamant that we need recurring strategic meetings between representatives from all municipalities and the county,” Dawkins said in a text. “The desire for the municipalities to engage with the county is a bright spot of this whole ordeal and gives me hope that we can start addressing the following with them quickly: Open up direct lines of communication, reestablish transparency and ultimately trust with each other, begin shaping a strategic direction for the county as a whole, and finally, begin executing that strategy together.”
Since the Board of Commissioners added four new commissioners in November (Smart, Dawkins, Andy Grooms and Toni Maples) there has been a consistent effort to heal the wound left by this decision and the way in which the decision was made. Rockingham and Hamlet threatened to file a lawsuit against the county last year alleging that the change to ad valorem — which County Manager Bryan Land said was in part needed because the cities hadn’t helped support the new 9-1-1 Center — constituted a breach of a contract between the two cities and the county which stated that neither city would be asked to support the Center.
After a mediation over this issue, the cities and the county reached a tolling agreement in April which put the lawsuit on hold while the parties made a “good faith effort” to resolve the sales tax issue without the content of their negotiations being admissible in court should the cities decide to move forward with the lawsuit. After a series of meetings with each municipality, the county submitted its first offer on May 24, which the municipalities saw as insufficient. All six municipalities met June 10 to work out their response, submitting their counter offer on June 15.
The county then sent its counter to the counter offer on June 17, which was received well and ultimately resulted in an agreement.
To support the Richmond County Daily Journal, subscribe at https://www.yourdailyjournal.com/subscribe or call 910-817-3111.
Reach Gavin Stone at 910-817-2673 or [email protected]
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