Cobb County Board of Commissioners Work Session – July 28, 2026
Cobb County Board of Commissioners Work Session – July 28, 2026
The Cobb County Board of Commissioners held a work session on Tuesday, July 28, 2026, in the afternoon. The meeting featured three presentations: an update on the American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds, a housing toolbox overview, and a data center regulatory framework. The board discussed progress, challenges, and next steps for each topic, with significant feedback on the need for detailed definitions, cost analyses, and community engagement.
ARPA Update
- Deputy County Manager Bill Volkman reported that the county received $147 million in direct ARPA funds, plus $19.6 million in earned interest, for a total allocation of $167.3 million to date.
- The programs have served over 1.1 million individual participants across categories: food/housing/shelter (819,000), public health (224,000), education/careers (34,000), safety/legal (28,000), transportation/infrastructure (9,000), and other (840).
- Of the $123 million spent, 47 programs are 100% exhausted, 31 are between 90–99% spent, 11 are 80–89% spent, and 10 are below 80% spent. The 10 programs on the watch list include Cobb Douglas Board of Health initiatives, Habitat for Humanity, and rental assistance.
- The South Cobb Health Complex ($9.7 million ARPA allocation, $8.5 million remaining) is the primary concern. Staff proposed using unrestricted interest dollars to cover the gap, shifting grant funds to other eligible projects, and ensuring no general fund or property tax dollars are needed. The board questioned the strategy, with Commissioner Gambrell calling it a "shell game." Staff confirmed that interest dollars have no restrictions and can be reallocated for any board-approved purpose, but ARPA grant dollars must be spent by September 30, 2026, and only on previously approved projects.
- The county is working with Deloitte to monitor spending and de-obligate funds if needed.
Housing Toolbox
- Community Development Director Jessica Gwynn and Planner Stephen Gonzalez presented a menu of housing tools organized into three phases: Quick Wins (0–2 years), Building the Toolbox (2–5 years), and Building the System (long-term).
- Tools highlighted included accessory dwelling units (ADUs), density bonuses, expedited permitting, land banks, and transfer of development rights (TDR). Staff noted that ADUs had been proposed in 2024 but not adopted; other tools like TDR are more complex and require significant coordination.
- Board members requested more detailed descriptions of all tools, cost implications (to the county vs. developers), references to successful implementations in other jurisdictions, and alignment with the ongoing Unified Development Code (UDC) update. Chairwoman expressed concern about public confusion without clear definitions. Commissioner Gambrell emphasized the need for cost data, and Commissioner Allen asked for examples of market-based solutions.
- Staff committed to providing a full matrix of tools with definitions, costs, and case studies, and to present it at a housing town hall planned for September 2026.
Data Centers
- Zoning Manager John Peterson presented a draft code section for data centers, as the current moratorium expires at the end of August 2026. A request to extend the moratorium for six months will be brought to the August 6 meeting.
- Proposed definition: "A facility containing one or more large-scale computer systems used for data storage and processing for off-site users." Board members raised concerns that the definition could capture server rooms at corporate offices (e.g., Home Depot, Cobb County IT). Staff agreed to refine the definition based on primary use, square footage, or megawatt capacity.
- Key proposed regulations:
- Permitted in light industrial (LI) and heavy industrial (HI) zones with a special land use permit; board discussion suggested possibly limiting to HI only.
- Minimum lot size 5 acres, maximum 30 acres; building height 50 feet; FAR 0.75; building setbacks 300 feet from residential/churches/schools/daycares, 50 feet from non-residential.
- Noise limits: 65 dB daytime (7am–11pm), 55 dB nighttime.
- Buffers: 200 feet natural buffer adjacent to residential, 100 feet for other uses.
- Lighting: 20 feet maximum height, set back 4x height from residential, with 0.05 foot-candles at property line.
- 8-foot decorative metal fence without anti-climbing devices.
- Decommissioning bond required.
- Water infrastructure: study on water usage, wastewater treatment plan, closed-loop cooling systems, 100% payment for infrastructure improvements, and adherence to industrial pretreatment standards.
- Board members requested additional requirements: energy load assessment, water usage caps, and heat dissipation impact studies. Commissioner Gambrell asked about the effect of heat on surrounding areas. The chairwoman noted a data center town hall scheduled for August 6, 2026, at the Cobb County Civic Center, featuring noise experts.
- Staff will incorporate board feedback into a final code amendment expected in fall 2026.
Key Outcomes
- ARPA: Staff will bring a strategy for the South Cobb Health Complex and other watch-list programs to a future meeting; no formal vote was taken.
- Housing: Staff will expand the toolbox presentation with full definitions, costs, and examples, and present it at the September housing town hall.
- Data Centers: The board directed staff to refine the definition of data centers, consider limiting locations to HI zones, and include energy and water capacity requirements. A moratorium extension will be requested at the August 6 regular meeting. The data center code amendment is expected to be adopted before the moratorium expires in early 2027.
- The meeting adjourned at an unspecified time, with the regular board meeting scheduled for 7:00 p.m. the same day.
Meeting Transcript
Good afternoon and welcome to today's Cobb County Board of Commissioners work session this Tuesday, July 28th of 2026. Today we have three presentations before the Board of Commissioners. The first is to provide an update on the American Rescue Plan Act. The second is to have information and updates regarding housing in Cobb County. And finally, to receive information regarding data centers. For our first presentation, we have Bill Volkman, our deputy county manager, and I will turn things over to him for this presentation. Thank you. And good afternoon, Chairwoman, Commissioners, County Manager. We are going to give you a ARPA update. And I just want to share with you some of the progress that has been made through the ARPA program to date, as well as kind of what our next steps are as we move to the final close out. So with that, we're going to touch on the ARPA award, the original award, but also the additional revenues that this generated and the total allocation that has been made to date. And then finally, we're going to close out on the ARPA watch list. Any projects that were kind of falling a little behind the spend program and kind of talk to you about what that may look like and then hit on the final summary and then open it up for any QA. So with that, uh the county received 147 million dollars of ARPA direct award, and we went through an extensive community-involved process to determine how that would be allocated out. But in addition to the original grant award, this program has earned $19.6 million of interest to date that has also been used to allocate out to programs for this ARPA project. So to date, we've allocated out 167.3 million dollars. And again, focusing on those key areas. And if you remember when we did this back, I think the original allocation, you really had one specific agenda item came forward for those pillars, and we identified all the subrecipients within those pillars that we were serving. Okay. So food, housing, and shelter, we've touched over 800,000, 819,000 individuals through those programs, public health 224,000, education and careers, 34,000, safety and legal, 28,000, transportation and infrastructure, 9,000, and then other uh 840. So overall, this program has touched over 1.1 million dollars of participants. So that's pretty big impact over the last few years. And we'll continue to update update these as we get through the final closeout. We'll bring back the final list of the impacts that we received. And yes, you're I think uh just to let you know, this is not individual. So if an individual received you know food and housing, it didn't mean they couldn't be eligible for public health. So this is individually how these programs have broken down over a million 1.1 million dollars of participants who have received some sort of funding or benefit. So, for example, chairwoman, I see kind of how that's formulating. So, for example, somebody could have seen received food assistance program, but then they could have also received a rental assistance program. So they could have been in the pipeline for a variety of programs, but each program we wanted to count the participants that were served under those those various buckets. Does that make sense? Yes, so the number on the right indicates individuals that receive service under that category. Okay. And I do want to pause here because I think this is a very important stat of one over 1.1 individual people who have received some sort of assistance through these various programs, and just want to see if there's any questions from the board before I move off of this slide. Yes, Commissioner. But in there, even if they received food and then they received housing, they were still counted once for each. Yes, that is correct. Any other questions? Okay, very good. All right, so this is going to get into more of the spend. So we just want to share with you of the 160 plus million dollars that we have allocated to date. 123 million has been spent to date. 47 programs have been 100% exhausted. And that this is important as we're getting close to that September 30th dial that September 30th deadline. We have 31 programs out there that are between 90 and 99 percent spent, and then as we move down 80 to 89 percent spent, we have 11 programs, and we have 10 programs that are below 80 percent spent. And we're gonna show you the breakdown of those programs, and that is going to be really our area of focus over the next month or two to kind of walk through the plans and strategies to really talk about how we get to that full spend, and for any programs that we can't get to that full spend, we've been working with our partners in Deloitte as well as any program who has received 100% spend. If there's any dollars that can be reallocated to them for a quick one-time purchase or to meet the original program criteria that they identified, we would go ahead and bring those forward as well. And we have been doing that throughout the process, so this isn't a last-minute knee-jerk reaction to say, hey, this is kind of where we are, and Deloitte and through our partners uh through our partners in Deloitte, they've had monthly or if not weekly check-ins with some of the programs on this list just to make sure we can clearly identify how they're gonna meet that mark. Any questions on the spend before we get into the 10 programs? Very good.
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