FORSYTH COUNTY, Ga. – The Forsyth County Board of Commissioners will hold three public hearings on the proposed 2021 millage rate beginning next week. Two meetings are scheduled for Thursday (July 9) at 11 a.m. and 5 p.m. in the County Administration Building, 110 E. Main Street in Cumming.

A third public hearing will be held on July 23 at 6 p.m.

The proposed county maintenance & operations millage rate remains unchanged at 4.791 mills. The proposed fire rate remains unchanged at 2.175 mills. The proposed bond rate will be reduced to 0.930 mills, a 4.1 percent decrease.

These rates will fund the county’s 2021 general operating budget, which is currently in the preliminary stages of development.

A growth of 4.67 percent in Forsyth County’s tax digest means that, while the county is maintaining the same millage rates with no change, the anticipated total collections will increase. Of the 4.67 percent growth, 2.55 percent is due to new construction in 2019 and the remaining 2.12 percent comes from increased values from reassessments.

Any change in an individual tax bill will depend upon the change in assessed valuation for that property and the value of any Homestead Exemption, which may also change with the assessed value.

When the total digest of taxable property is prepared, Georgia law requires that a rollback millage rate must be computed that will produce the same total revenue on the current year’s digest that last year’s millage rate would have produced had no reassessments or growth occurred.

The preliminary 2021 budget presented to the Forsyth County Board of Commissioners is based on a millage rate higher than the rollback millage rate, therefore before the Board of Commissioners may set a final millage rate, Georgia law requires three public hearings to be held to allow the public an opportunity to express their opinions on the increase.

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