DALTON, Ga. — Downtown Dalton property owners will face higher property tax bills this fall unless their property values fell enough to offset the impact of a new higher tax rate.

The board of the Downtown Dalton Development Authority (DDDA) voted to more than double the property tax rate to 2.5 mills from .95 mills in the downtown business area.

A mill is equal to $1 for each $100,000 of taxable value. The city of Dalton taxes at 100 percent of assessed value. The owner of a building assessed at $100,000 would see his or her tax increase to $2.50 a year from 95 cents.

DDDA board members are elected by those who own property and businesses in the downtown business area, which stretches roughly from Morris Street north to Waugh Street and from Thornton Avenue east to the railroad tracks. The DDDA helps market downtown properties and businesses, promotes events downtown and administers grants to help downtown businesses upgrade their facades.

DDDA interim director George Woodward said the vote was unanimous with all six board members — Caleb Carnes, John Davis, T.J. Kaikobad, Juan Lama, Meagan Shepard and Jane Marie Wilson — voting yes.

Woodward said the new property rate is expected to bring in about $150,000, compared to $93,000 under the old rate which had been unchanged since 2010.

The DDDA has been without a permanent executive director since Garrett Teems left in April 2017. Teems was being paid $39,000 when he left. Woodward said that to get a director with the experience and skills the board wants it will have to pay substantially more than that. Woodward said a personnel committee of himself, Carnes and Wilson are currently drafting a job description be presented to the full board at an upcoming meeting. But he said the board is not likely to hire someone until late this year, after tax revenues come in to fund the position.

The DDDA, the Vinson Institute and Believe Greater Dalton are currently working on a plan for the downtown business area. Believe Greater Dalton is a public-private partnership of the Greater Dalton Chamber of Commerce and local governments aimed at implementing a five-year strategic plan for Dalton and Whitfield County.

“We are looking for someone who will be capable of implementing that plan and moving forward with any projects that it includes,” said Wilson, the board chairman and owner of Mama Wilson’s Homemade Cookies and Cakes.

Woodward said the plan is expected to be delivered by the end of the year.

But former Dalton Mayor David Pennington, who pushed the DDDA to cut its tax rate, which stood at 3 mills when he took office in 2008, said the tax increase was a step backwards.

“Dalton taxes at 100 percent (of assessed value),” he said. “Just about everywhere else, they tax at 40 percent. So that 1.55-mill increase is like a 4-mill increase anywhere else. They have to understand that people aren’t going want to come here and live and to set up businesses and if we keep increasing taxes.”

But DDDA board treasurer Carnes, owner of Carnes & Company CPA, said that tax rates aren’t the only thing that entrepreneurs look at when deciding where to open a business. He says they also look at the quality of services a city has to offer.