Fulton County remains in good financial shape with a $157 million surplus, Commission Chairman John Eaves told business and community leaders gathered for a breakfast meeting in his first delivery of a State of the County address this year.

Eaves, speaking at the North Fulton Chamber of Commerce Eggs  & Enterprises Breakfast in Alpharetta.

“We’ve actually cut spending back to the level that we were at in 2001,” Eaves said.

That was scant comfort to Mike Fitzgerald. The 25-year resident of North Fulton said the county no longer needed to fund police and fire services in recently incorporated cities, “and now you come up here and tell us about how the coffers of the county are full,” Fitzgerald said.

The county funds projects such as the Wolfe Creek Amphitheater in South Fulton and an aviation museum at Charlie Brown Airport.

“Has the County Commission considered a tax cut instead of funding all of these frivolous projects?” Fitzgerald asked.

Eaves said a tax cut is not being considered. He promised better control on spending and more efficient use of resources. Funding projects like the $1 million spent for Alpharetta’s amphitheater several years ago is just a political reality, he said.

Andy Macke of Comcast, the chamber’s education committee chairman, asked about Milton County.

“I have opposed creation of Milton County, and the board has opposed creation of Milton,” Eaves said.

“We can do a much better job in terms of distribution of resources throughout the county,” the chairman said, telling chamber members he was committed to this.

Fulton County has invested in the Johns Creek Environmental Campus in Roswell and is looking at the possibility of a new senior citizen center in North Fulton. And Eaves said he created a One Fulton commission to get business leaders’ input on how to do a better job to meet the needs of North Fulton.

“As I see the evolution of Fulton County, I don’t think a new county is the answer to our challenges,” he said.

He said the county could coordinate services better with Atlanta, and better service delivery to other cities.

One of the biggest challenges facing the county is transportation. Roswell Mayor Jere Wood asked Eaves how he could ask his city’s residents to vote for a transportation referendum that adds a one-cent sales tax.

“Right now, citizens of Fulton County and DeKalb County are already paying one penny for transportation, it’s called MARTA,” Wood said.

Now they are being asked to pay an additional penny when the other eight counties in the region are only being asked to pay one penny, he said.

Eaves said he has mixed feelings about the double taxation. It is inherently unfair. What he hopes to accomplish is to lobby the General Assembly to adjust the funding mechanism which controls where the monies go that are collected. The regional transportation funding allows 15 percent of the funds to be used for local projects. The county is asking legislators to draft a new bill that will allow for 25 percent to be kept locally, which he said will help make it equitable.

He also wants the new penny sales tax funding to be used for MARTA operations, which are prohibited by the law setting up the regional transportation referendums.

Eaves said he is on record that a regional transit system is needed that goes outside the nucleus of the city.