Tucker, GA — Tucker residents on Nov. 8 voted to let the city take over more public works duties from DeKalb County, with 75% of voters supporting it.

Now, Tucker is planning to get to work.

“In 2016, the city of Tucker was established by its residents to provide local oversight of key day-to-day operations and public services,” a press release from the city says. “The residents of Tucker have spoken and have overwhelmingly acknowledged the need for change to its roadway maintenance and stormwater services delivery.”

The city says it is beginning to execute its plans for providing these services and wants to address a backlog of projects. The transition should be complete by July 2023, the press release from the city says.

“We are grateful to the Tucker community for affirming their confidence in us and overwhelmingly approving this referendum,” Mayor Frank Auman said. “The council, staff, and I are excited and ready to get to work providing our residents with safe roads, working infrastructure, and the levels of responsiveness and service they deserve. We intend to deliver on our commitment and promise to be more responsive, more reliable and more locally accountable.”

City Manager Tami Hanlin also spoke about the city’s goals for the upcoming year.

“Within the first 365 days, our goal is to prioritize and work through deferred public works maintenance and address key repairs,” Hanlin said. “Now that the community has spoken, we can move forward and develop a service delivery model that will eliminate long-deferred needs, get us to a more normal level of meeting current maintenance needs, and ultimately take us on to focusing on preventive maintenance.  We will reduce current repair and maintenance times by 50% by our second year of operations, while saving significant costs of operation.”

Projects on the to-do list include:

— Asphalt patching

—  Pothole repairs

— Right-of-way maintenance

— Sidewalk and curb repairs

— Traffic sign/signal maintenance

— Bridge maintenance

— Pavement marking maintenance

— Transportation engineering services.

— Stormwater infrastructure and catch basin repairs

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