I think cityhood is the way. DeKalb County cannot govern what it currenly has. The current leaders have no real plan or idea to how to bring the county together. There idea is to pump more money into south DeKalb and try to bring industry there.

And from the Neighborhood Sumit that DeKalb has not to long back - they are not planning to change. The drive it to develop south DeKalb and fight cityhood in the corts with our tax dollars.

Here is a link an article about the summit:
http://northdruidhills.patch.com/blog_posts/dekalb-county-reactive-neighborhood-summit

Commissioner Watson is a powerful and savvy politician, just watch him in his breakfast meetings at Wesley Chapel. I admire the man, yet his understanding of causation is misplaced if he thinks incorporation is at the root of DeKalb governance issues.

He knows that, but the argument of 'walled off, rich cities' sells. If DeKalb was even slightly proactive in reducing it's spending after Dunwoody incorporated Brookhaven might not have passed it's EMANCIPATION. The Commission and CEO choose not to listen to what was being said in North DeKalb about Parks and Recreation being ignored while gorgeous new facilities were being built elsewhere.

When music stops, will you have a chair?

No, having so many municipalities is not the most efficient, if only counties like DeKalb were run properly these municipalities wouldn't be needed, as it is citizens have the right to divorce themselves from the Dekalb Democrat bureacracy as much as possible, through cityhood.

It seems to me that these 'mini-cities' are an attempt to (1) control a bigger piece of the revenue pie while (2) separating the underprivileged communities from some of that pie. At the end of the day it creates another layer of bureaucracy paid for with that revenue. We don't need more layers; we simply need more effective layers. We do that by defining the objectives for the bureaucracy so that we have a way to test whether it has performed effectively.

Mr. Tim, in addition to the seven DeKalb County cities listed in your article, there are four more for a total of eleven cities:

Atlanta (in DeKalb)
Clarkston
Doraville
Pine Lake

Please pass the yellow mustard!

The Metro Atlanta has way to many fiftons. It is not the cities that are the problem, the local units know what is best for their locals. The problem is the large number of counties, and they do not know how to work together. Combining some or all of these counties would get rid of a large percentage of the duplicate bureaucracy and bring in a lot more efficience.

The rise in "mini-cities" is NIMBYism gone wild. I have a hard time seeing how anything regional or statewide can get accomplished if everyone is only looking out for their little fiefdoms and now have to deal with another layer of bureaucracy.

I believe many of Atlanta's problems are due to lack of an authority overseeing/coordinating the metro area. I know that's crazy talk, but other cities are doing it: http://www.economist.com/node/10809127.

If the County governments--Fulton and Dekalb--were more responsive to ALL their constituents and run more efficiently, there would not be a need (nor a demand) for local cities. This move towards "local" has been the answer to County governments that are over staffed, poorly managed, do not outsource some services etc.

It is not the fault of the city proponents that there are so many cities. It is the decades of mismanagement by the County governments that has frustrated the electorate to the point of being open to localizing.

It's probably worth mentioning here that earlier this year Georgia was ranked *the* most corrupt state in the Union by the Center for Public Integrity: http://www.publicintegrity.org/2012/03/16/8427/georgia-worst-score-country

And now it is time to break up the County school districts (especially DeKalb) and bring control of education closer to the communities. Get prepared for those battles. Anyone who disagrees does not have children currently in these districts, has their head in the sand, or a combination of both.

Since you are offering, I'll take two! Thank you, Mr. Burger. Nothing like a good fracturing!

I agree with the excess number of counties. The problem in consolidating them would be that the rural folk have too much of their identity wrapped up in their county name.

It would be unlawful to create another county. Georgia has it max - unless of course those laws are changed.

The problem isn't the number of cities, its perhaps the number of counties or the lack of good coordinated oversite/funding. For example Grady ends up largely providing emergency care for the entire 10 to 20 metro county region yet its Fulton and DeKalb that fund it all.

Keep in mind counties providing municipal services is not the normal way to do things. Most states in urban/suburban areas have the counties much like the current Fulton county where several municipal services are provided by the cities thus relieving the County of that responsibility.

The problem in DeKalb is not too many cities but too much unincorporated areas that are not having their more localized services provided by Cities, towns or villages.

As has been said since Dunwoody was seeking to become a city, DeKalb needs to sit down and figure out how the county should be divided up so that viable cities cover the entire County. Dekalb has to date ignored that and as mentioned above also failed to make the necessary adjustments to lower expenses as their responsibilities were reduced by cities taking on services.

Regional Transportation and Transit is not effected by these services. So the idea of coordination being more difficult is sort of a red herring.

YES, there are too many governments! I don't think the govt (city or county) is the problem. I believe the problem lies with the elected officials. Just creating more govt because we don't like the ones currently elected does not solve the problem and only creates another platform for more problems down the road. Where does it stop, with a new state or a new country? I'd prefer to deal with a single or consolidated govt but that seems out of the question so my next choice would be some type of township or village concept. Currently cities and counties compete instead of complimenting each other in their pursuit of tax money and in the delivery of services. IMHO the counties of DeKalb, Cobb, Gwinnett, Fulton and Clayton should provide the big ticket items: public works, public safety, water and sewer. The townships could focus items like code enforcement, permits, planning and etc.

We southerners are too ignant (and prideful) to look to the north for innovative ideas on governance. But, clearly the current model in GA needs serious reconditioning. The Feds should pick up the tab for the always promised but never achieved "Reconstruction" of the southern states.

To the point, there may not be enough cities yet, but the various Metro republican groups are working around the clock to ensure there is a balkanization to allow republicans to control small areas where they cannot hold sway over large areas.

When the small areas fail, fall back and blame the Democrats.