Bill aims to have HOST in Cobb County

Cobb County officials are interested in offering some property tax relief to be offset by an increase in their sales tax. Their proposal would resemble DeKalb County’s existing homestead option sales tax which primarily provides for property tax relief but also allows for some of the sales tax revenue to go toward infrastructure improvements. Rep. John Carson (R-Marietta) is sponsoring the proposal, which is being called an "alternative HOST," through HB 548.  The bill, which was just introduced last week, probably faces an uphill climb to get passed this year given how late we are into this legislative session.

At this point it seems like the Cobb County proposal more closely resembles DeKalb’s older/existing HOST model, rather than the DeKalb legislators’ newly proposed “equalized HOST” model that’s being considered through HB 215. DeKalb County and Rockdale County are the only counties currently administering a HOST.