Citizen Richard Walton stated “some” firefighters are “running rampant” “doing whatever they want to” and said “What they’re doing is wrong, and it’s going to cost someone their life.”
by Janice Daniel
The Haralson County Board of Commissioners held their monthly work session on Tuesday, February 17th, 2026 at 6:00 p.m. at the Commission Office, 155 Van Wert Street, Buchanan. Voting members present were:
Vice Chair, District 1 Commissioner David Tarpley
District 2 Commissioner Danny Elsberry
District 3 Commissioner Eddie Ivey
District 4 Commissioner Ryan Farmer
Non-voting officials present were:
County Attorney Avery Jackson
County Clerk Julia Watson
Chairman Brian Walker was absent.
Vice-Chair Tarpley called the meeting to order. The first presentation was from Tyler White, a Community Planner with the Northwest Georgia Regional Commission (NWGRC), along with Ethan Calhoun and Cole Allen, regarding the county’s Comprehensive Plan. The Georgia Planning Act of 1989 requires each local government to update their comprehensive plan every five (5) years in order to maintain eligibility for state loans, grants and permits. In partnership with the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, the Northwest Georgia Regional Commission assists local governments in preparing their joint comprehensive plan to present the local vision and goals, list each community’s needs and priorities, and develop a five-year work program to address those needs.
A comprehensive plan has significant benefits for a whole community as it helps to identify, define and protect important existing resources while also providing a blueprint for future growth that ensures equity and resilience for all stakeholders. Such a plan provides for common goals and community consensus as opposed to “spot zoning.” A comprehensive plan may address such things as existing and proposed land uses, impact on neighborhood character, traffic and public transportation, utilities and infrastructure, housing resources and needs, economic development and tourism, and protection of historic, cultural, natural and agricultural resources.
Haralson is one of the fifteen (15) counties assisted by the NWGRC to keep their comprehensive plan up-to-date. The next required update for Haralson is February 28th, 2027.
White said this is the first public hearing of several that will be held in April, May and June this year, and these hearings will be advertised as to the location, date and time. It is crucial to allow all citizens and other stakeholders to take part in the planning process for land use and community goals. He also stated that there will be one-on-one meetings with staff and commissioners for compiling plan drafts.
Once the draft plan is completed, the Board of Commissioners will send it to the Department of Community Affairs to make sure it meets the required standards. Once approved, it is good for five more years.
Two representatives of the Fleet Management Division of Enterprise Holdings, Inc. were at the meeting to present a plan to lease the Sheriff Department vehicles and keep them newer and with lower mileage within a ten-year period. They have performed a study of the current county law enforcement vehicles, and told the Board they perform this fleet management for a lot of counties and municipalities in the state of Georgia, and are able to save them significant amounts of money while at the same time providing them with a lease agreement for newer, more fuel-efficient vehicles which require less maintenance.
They said their plan would save the county close to $500,000 over a ten-year period, but Vice-Chair Tarpley pointed out their presentation shows increasing costs in the 7th, 8th, 9th and 10th years that would actually increase the county’s current average yearly amount spent on law enforcement vehicles. Tarpley also said that Enterprise had overestimated the residual value of the cars at the point of trade-in which would significantly increase the costs represented on their proposal.
Throughout the discussion it became clear that the county would still be responsible for the $17,000 per car upfit out-of-pocket, or add this to the lease payment, raising it considerably higher on the monthly payment. Tarpley, as well as District 2 Commissioner Danny Elsberry expressed concerns over the mileage per year for each car estimated by Enterprise, and said Haralson County’s numbers were significantly higher. It seemed to be the general consensus among the board members that this plan might not be the right fit for Haralson County, but they thanked the Enterprise representatives for being there.
Item #3 on the agenda was in reference to the McBrayer Road Easement, a subject which came up a couple of months ago. County Attorney Avery Jackson said that the property where the government complex is to be built on Inframetals Way has a small sliver of land still owned by the county which the adjacent landowner wishes to purchase. Jackson advised this is only 0.03 acres and is of no use to the county whatsoever, and that the law allows an adjacent property owner to purchase such a small piece of land without going through the sealed bid process used for larger acreage. The county has been offered $3,000 for the small strip, calculated by dividing $100,000 (cost of an acre) by 0.03, and this item will be taken up in the Regular Session in March.
In Item #4 the Board was asked to consider adding a ROTH option to the current 457B employee retirement plan at no cost to the county. The employees who choose this option would pay 100% of the cost out-of-pocket, and it would give them the option to make after-tax contributions to their retirement plan. David Bell said the county would need to adopt the ACCG (Advancing Georgia Counties) language if they decide to give employees the ROTH option.
Item #5 was a request from the World Children’s Center for a refund of the property tax they paid on five parcels of land in the county for the years 2021, 2022 and 2023. Chief Tax Assessor Zachary Smith told the Board that this organization applied for tax exemption due to their 501(c) status as a non-profit entity. Smith said the Tax Assessors Office received this application late in 2024 and approved it in January of 2025, so the World Children’s Center did not pay property tax for 2024. The total of their refund request for the three years they did pay property tax is $60,978.72. District 3 Commissioner Eddie Ivey asked Smith to please check and see when their 501(C) status was approved and report that information to the March meeting. Vice-Chair Tarpley asked why they had waited so long to ask for this refund, to which Smith replied he did not know.
Item #6 was presented by Attorney Jackson regarding a concern which came up about the RFP issued for replacement of the concrete drive/parking lot at the Waco Fire Station. Jackson said the demolition and removal of the old concrete was performed by the county, and the contractor who won the bid would only do the replacement. Jackson stated that the RFQ called for “licensed and bonded” construction companies to bid, and one of the bidders thought that meant licensed by the state. He said county staff thought it just meant a business license, and the RFQ doesn’t require a state license, although the county could require that if they wanted. Vice-Chair Tarpley said that only two (2) of the bidders were licensed.
Item #7 was a review and discussion of changes needed for the Haralson County Handbook. Vice-Chair Tarpley said he was reviewing the red-lined copy of the handbook showing the additions, changes and deletions, and noticed some things that were not redlined that he thought the Board wanted to eliminate. Most of the sentences Tarpley pointed out were where he thought the “Commission Chairman” should be replaced by “HR Director”. This change had been made in some places, but not others, and he pointed out pages and paragraphs where the change still needed to be made because he thought the board wanted to get away from employee-related issues.
The other Board Members seemed to be in agreement until Tarpley reached the last paragraph on page 24, where District 4 Commissioner Ryan Farmer said “We don’t need to strike Chairman on that one.” Farmer went on to say this is where a resolution of a problem needs to be made by a panel of three people, consisting of a department head, the HR Director and the Commission Chairman, only in cases where a resolution cannot be reached in all the steps prior to this one. “It is a standard sentence in employee handbooks,” Commissioner Farmer said, “and it doesn’t need to be changed.”
Vice-Chair Tarpley then asked if anyone wanted to speak in the Public Participation of the meeting, and was advised there were two names on the list.
First was Richard Walton of Coppermine Road. Walton wanted to address some issues going on in the County Fire Department. He stated that he was a retired fireman, and that he had received an email about some safety issues that “y’all need to look into.” He advised that some of the people in the Fire Department were “running rampant, doing whatever they want to do, putting stuff on fire trucks that is out of service just for a couple of ISO points.”
Walton asked the Commissioners if they could exchange one or two ISO points for a human life? “What they’re doing is wrong, and it’s going to cost someone their life.”
Walton also stated that the email which was sent to him listed several names of Fire Department managers that were putting firefighters at risk due to safety hazards of equipment he was referring to, and asked, “Are y’all willing to talk to these people? Safety issues can’t be overlooked. Firefighters’ safety is first and foremost on the check-off list in getting ready to head to a fire. Some of these boys don’t have a big brother or someone to turn to and say y’all need to pay attention.”
Walton advised the Board, “This can go further if it’s not addressed by the Board of Commissioners. Y’all don’t experience what firefighters go through. Enough is enough. Somebody needs to grow a backbone and stand up for these boys who risk their lives. Somebody needs to be held accountable for these safety violations, and the ball is in your court. As a tax-paying citizen I’m asking y’all to make the right decision on this.”
The second person on the list was Randall George, a process server from the Erramilli Law Group of Tucker, Georgia, who said he was there to serve papers on each individual commissioner in regard to the Michael Wilson vs. Haralson County law suit, and each commissioner took their papers and accepted service for Chairman Walker in his absence. Attorney Avery Jackson said he had offered to accept service of the papers on behalf of the commissioners, but George wanted to do it at this public meeting.
The work session was then adjourned.