Cobb County and the City of Mableton say they have reached a proposed agreement on police, transportation, and stormwater services after more than a year of talks that ended in formal mediation.
What’s happening: Cobb County Chairwoman Lisa Cupid and Mableton Mayor Michael Owens each put out statements Tuesday saying mediation produced a proposed deal. Neither statement included dollar figures or other specifics.
What’s important: The agreement is not done yet. Attorneys are still writing up the final documents, and both the Cobb County Board of Commissioners and the Mableton City Council have to vote to approve it. Owens said details will be released before the city council votes.
Background: Mableton became a city in 2023, one of the newest cities in Georgia. That set off a fight with Cobb County over who would provide services to Mableton residents and who would foot the bill.
In mid-2025, the two sides struck a temporary one-year deal to avoid penalties from the Georgia Department of Community Affairs, the state agency that oversees how local governments divide up services. Under that deal, Mableton paid Cobb County $9.5 million for police and transportation services. Mableton officials called it double taxation, pointing out that city residents already pay county property taxes.
Cobb County said the payment was necessary so that people living in unincorporated parts of the county and in other cities would not end up paying for services they do not use. That same temporary deal also had Mableton take over zoning, code enforcement, business licensing, and trash collection.
How this affects real people: Mableton residents have been caught in the middle of a dispute over who pays for police patrols, road upkeep, and stormwater drainage. Both Cupid and Owens said the new proposed agreement would keep those services running without interruption.
The path forward: Both governing bodies must vote before anything takes effect. No vote dates have been set.
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B.T. Clark is an award-winning journalist and the Publisher of The Georgia Sun. He has 25 years of experience in journalism and served as Managing Editor of Neighbor Newspapers in metro Atlanta for 15 years and Digital Director at Times-Journal Inc. for 8 years. His work has appeared in several newspapers throughout the state including Neighbor Newspapers, The Cherokee Tribune and The Marietta Daily Journal. He is a Georgia native and a fifth-generation Georgian.
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