They haven’t filed yet, but at least two people have informally discussed running for the Bibb County Commission, and both have been in The Telegraph lately. So, for the record:

Mallory Jones, a real estate agent in north Macon, plans to run for the north Bibb County seat now occupied by Elmo Richardson. Jones recently donated $750 to fund 10 adoptions out of Macon’s animal shelter, and the last free pet was adopted Wednesday.

Tom Wagoner, whose company runs health plans, has discussed his own plan to run for the Bibb County commission chairman seat now occupied by Sam Hart. Wagoner wrote a letter to the editor in which he said he was never asked to guarantee $1 million in savings if his company was picked. Wagoner was asked by Commissioner Joe Allen whether he’d put that $1 million claim in writing, and Wagoner declined ... until it appeared in a letter to the editor.

The only non-incumbent commissioner who has so far filed with the state is Robert L. Abbott, who filed as a Republican. Abbott lives near Lake Tobesofkee.

Davis campaign launches Facebook page, website

A Facebook page and website connected to Bibb County Chief Deputy David Davis’s sheriff campaign went live Thursday night.

By Friday afternoon, the David Davis for Bibb County Sheriff Facebook page, facebook.com/DavidDavis2012, had garnered more than 50 “likes.”

“I really was humbled and encouraged by the number of positive responses we’ve gotten,” Davis said.

The Facebook page and daviddavisforsheriff.com went live at 9:30 p.m. Thursday as part of Davis’ public campaign launch. “It’s all in an effort to engage the public both in the campaign and to make them feel like this is their sheriff’s office,” he said.

Davis said he plans to have opportunities in the near future for residents to meet with him and discuss his vision for the future.

Davis filed paperwork last April, saying he planned to run for the job this year.

Estimates of estimates

Consultants and Bibb County employees are still working to figure out how much it will actually cost to transition employees and five departments from Macon to Bibb County. Macon and Bibb County officials also are trying to figure out if some pension money can move with the employees.

Here’s some back-of-the-envelope math to beat the estimates. Take it with some big grains of salt, but it’s likely illustrative of Bibb County’s coming budget dilemmas.

The current total cost of those employees is said to be right around $5 million to Macon, with $2.3 million in costs attributed to the recreation department alone. The pay scales are different -- Bibb’s is generally lower, but is trying to bolster its own pay. Recreation will be paid for with local option sales tax money before either government gets a cut, meaning Bibb County really bears the burden for 40 percent of the $2.3 million in recreation employee costs -- call it $900,000, plus $2.7 million for the other employees, for a total cost of $3.6 million. Now, personnel costs are generally about 70 percent of total government costs when you factor in everything from gas for string trimmers to Post-It notes and computers. All of a sudden, the costs of taking over those departments may look more like $5.1 million.

The service delivery strategy agreement that launched the move called for $5.37 million in annual liabilities to be transferred from the city to the county.

It’s also worth noting, as Bibb’s departmental budgets start coming together, that the county funded this year’s budget with both a tax increase and a further draw-down of its financial reserves -- meaning even with the tax increase, the county still wasn’t breaking even.

On top of that, Bibb County’s new salary scale for existing employees will add about $438,000 in costs above the current budget.

Commissioner Lonzy Edwards is pointing out the commission as a whole hasn’t begun discussing where revenues will come from or where spending cuts will begin.

Go SPLOST!

The Robins Regional Chamber of Commerce endorsed the Houston County special purpose local option sales tax this week at its monthly board meeting, according to a news release.

Houston County officials are asking voters to renew the six-year penny sales tax in a March 6 referendum. They estimate it will generate $155 million for projects throughout Houston County and its three cities.

“The Houston County Board of Commissioners and the cities of Centerville, Perry and Warner Robins are all focused and locked on to both the long and short term issues that are critical to Robins (Air Force Base), Economic Development, Public Safety and Recreation and Community Infrastructure,” said Walter “Randy” Randall, the chamber’s chairman-elect said in the news release. “SPLOST will allow us to maintain the high standards the Robins Region is known for.”

Mining trash for savings

Crawford County officials are thinking they could save money by privatizing some of Crawford County’s trash hauling to Advanced Disposal.

Two county commissioners are scheduled to meet with the company at 1 p.m. Tuesday to discuss the proposal. County Manager Pat Kelly said a member of the road crew now spends about half his job hauling trash from the county’s transfer station to a landfill in Barnesville. Advanced Disposal can come in with a compactor to make the trash runs twice as efficient, and leave the truck maintenance and fuel to Advanced Disposal.

Kelly said the county has vacancies on its road crew and he could probably eliminate one position after privatization, saving more money by eliminating the other half of a vacant job.

A county employee would remain at the transfer station, which is open 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Tuesdays through Saturdays.

Invisible reporter?

Telegraph reporter Mike Stucka, who has covered Bibb County government for more than two years, was surprised to learn this week that he doesn’t exist.

He’s there whenever the commission is debating or deciding issues, and his stories appear in our pages regularly. Or maybe that’s just white space.

Some members of Macon City Council perceive the latter.

Councilman Frank Tompkins, backed by a couple of co-sponsors, passed a resolution this week to eventually broadcast not just the biweekly meetings in which council ratifies things it has hashed out in committee, but also those long, often-rancorous committee meetings themselves.

Tompkins said he wants to change the public’s image of the council, presumably for the better. Though he eventually supported it, Council President James Timley was initially dubious because broadcasting committee debates would open the council to a “double dose of scrutiny.”

Meanwhile, he said, the Bibb County Commission gets no scrutiny at all.

“We never know what they’re doing,” Timley groused.

His complaint, endorsed by several others, was a bit puzzling because just a few days earlier many council members openly cited one of Stucka’s stories as their only source of information on the county’s intentions regarding an employee transfer.

Writers Jim Gaines, Mike Stucka, Amy Leigh Womack and Christina M. Wright contributed to this report.