Last month the Georgia General Assembly, in a bipartisan effort, passed legislation that allows voters to decide in regions throughout Georgia if they want to levy a 1 percent sales and use tax for regional transportation investments.  

Here in the Atlanta region, this could potentially raise over a billion dollars a year for needed transportation investments over the next decade.

Passage of a regional transportation sales tax is critical to our communities and regional growth.  

Not surprisingly, the significance of this legislation wasn’t lost on our economic competitors.  

Articles about the legislation’s passage appeared in online newspapers as far west as San Francisco and in business magazines in both the United States and Canada.  

As each local community in the Atlanta region begins the task of determining which transportation projects and programs they might want to construct or operate with a regional sales tax, we need to remember that our economic competitors, as well as potential employers thinking about relocating to our region, will be paying close attention to what we do.  

Let’s use this exercise as an opportunity to show the rest of the nation and the world that the Atlanta region is truly a community ready to invest in its transportation infrastructure for the next generation.

Terry D. Lawler

Executive Director Regional Business Coalition of Metropolitan Atlanta