Toccoa Commission Holds Regular Meeting

The city of Toccoa will now allow its employees to credit a certain amount of unused sick leave time towards their years of service when it comes to retirement.

On Monday, the city commission unanimously approved an ordinance to amend and re-state the employee retirement plan to that effect.

The changes were also approved as part of revisions to the personnel policy manual that the commission adopted in April.

Toccoa City Manager Billy Morse said this applies to employees who have met the requirements for regular retirement.

“You have for your consideration an ordinance and an adoption agreement to allow unused sick leave to be converted to credited service when calculating retirement benefits for city employees,” said Morse. “It is specifically a maximum of six months.”

Morse said the change should not have any impact on the city’s immediate budget.

Also on Monday, city commissioners unanimously voted to approve a resolution to accept a grant from the Georgia Department of Natural Resources’ Historic Preservation Division for Phase One of a Historic Resources Survey.

Morse said the resolution is necessary in order to officially receive $6,000 in grant funding that the city was awarded back in May to do this survey.

“We are being asked to approve an agreement outlining we will follow the steps required to complete the project,” said Morse. “Basically, those steps are that we will follow all federal rules and regulations and that we have one year to complete the project.”

According to Main Street Toccoa, the grant will help the city update the city-wide survey of all of the historic resources, such as buildings, that the city has.

Main Street said Phase One will cover the historic downtown area.

The city’s grant is a 60-40 grant, meaning that Toccoa will spend $4,000 to receive the $6,000 in grant funding, and city officials say that money is budgeted.

Finally on Monday, Morse informed city commissioners that Toccoa had received a permanent utility easement from the Stephens County Development Authority for water and sewer lines in the Hayestone-Brady Business Park.

Morse said that this gives the city the authority to go on to property to inspect, maintain, and repair those lines as needed.