Tybee Island seeks special sales tax to fund infrastructure upgrades

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Tybee Island City Council meeting on Thursday, Dec. 12.

Credit: City of Tybee Island

Tybee Island officials are asking residents and tourists alike to share in the cost of future infrastructure projects through a proposed 1% sales tax on all goods purchased in the popular beach town.

However, the city first needs state lawmakers to give the go-ahead in the form of a bill authorizing a ballot referendum, to be voted on by Tybee's roughly 3,000 residents next fall.

Tybee Island councilmembers asked for just that at their Thursday night meeting, unanimously approving the town's policy agenda for the 2025 legislative session which begins Jan. 13.

Mayor Brian West said that such a tax would help the city pay for much-needed improvements to water, wastewater and stormwater services.

"This would shift the burden of paying for that infrastructure to the almost 5 million tourists that come to our island, and not so much on just the residents, who are currently paying for that infrastructure through our water bills," West said.

The policy agenda prepared by city staff puts the pricetag for critical upgrades at more than $100 million to address "chronic flooding" as well as ailing water and sewer infrastructure, some of which was built nearly a century ago.

"We're dealing with a lot of needs that have been delayed over decades, and my feeling is that we can't pass the cost of all of that delayed work [onto] today's rate payers," said Tybee Island Councilmember Kathryn Williams.

Known as a Municipal Option Sales Tax, or "MOST," the levy has also been utilized by several other Georgia municipalities, including Atlanta and the three metro cities of College Park, East Point and Hapeville.