MARIETTA - Public safety comes out on top in Cobb County government's proposed fiscal year 2011 budget, which was unveiled to the public Tuesday.

Public safety, which includes police, sheriff's office, animal control, public safety training and administration, and some 911 operations, will receive 39 percent, or $128,288,667, of the county's proposed $328,259,554 general fund budget. While county officials are asking other departments to cut back on their budgets and impose a hiring freeze, they have repeatedly promised residents that public safety will continue to be a top priority for the county and its funding sources. The fire department is funded through the county's separate, 2.56 percent Fire District Fund millage rate, which is expected to receive $65,611,370 in 2011.

Public safety for FY11 is slated to receive a higher percentage of the county's general fund budget than it did in FY 10 (38 percent) and the previous fiscal year (37 percent).

The proposed FY11 budget is expected to be approved by the Board of Commissioners on Sept. 28. Both revenue and expenses are 2.88 percent less than the adopted FY10 budget.

A big money-loser for years has been the county-funded Mable House Barnes Amphitheatre, for which the county has had to kick in $2.6 million since 2007 to make up for expenditures not covered by revenue. The theater opened in 2003 with an overall construction cost of $7.1 million, $5.8 million of which the state funded.

County spokesman Robert Quigley said revenues are generated through ticket sales for concerts and facility rentals.

"Expenses have exceeded revenues from the beginning, but the gap has slowly narrowed as tickets sales increased. This is based on people becoming more aware of the facility and the types of acts the county has brought in," Quigley said.

The county also funds the Cobblestone Golf Course in Acworth. The Board of Commissioners voted in January to pay $617,000 for major renovation of the course's grounds. The county is expected to pay $2,039,396 to the golf course this year, 6.71 percent less than last year. The course has slowly begun to lose money the past few years, partly due to a decline in conditions. Quigley said the county pays the course's private management company, Affiniti Golf, $5,000 a month, plus 2 percent of the course's revenue each month.

"We look forward to the day that the economy is vibrant again and we can privatize the course," then-Chairman Sam Olens said in January.

Quigley also said a $500,000 matching grant for the Marietta Aeronautical Museum and Education Center, Inc., which the board denied last fall after Olens said the group failed to meet parameters set by the county for them to receive the funds, remains in reserve for the project, but "does not actually appear in any budgets." The county approved a new leasing contract for the museum with the Marietta History Museum in July, when it was transferred to the Marietta History Museum to manage.

The county expects to see a 16.72 percent increase in revenues generated from licenses and permits, rising from $17,504,838 in 2010 to $20,431,344 in 2011. It also expects a 5 percent increase, or almost $1 million, in revenues from fines and forfeitures. These increases are due to the county preparing to increase fees. But the county will also be hit with a 5.22 percent decrease, or almost $10 million, in revenues from property taxes and a 19.07 percent decrease, almost $1 million, in federal and state funding.

Hefty operational costs will also rise in FY 2011, as the county's new courthouse, detention facility and DOT facility, all funded through the 2005 special purpose local option sales tax, will be built and the county will take on costs for day-to-day operations.

The county's 2011 capital projects budget is $7.1 million, which is 13.7 percent more than 2010's capital projects budget of $6.3 million. One of the main capital projects for FY11 is the Powder Springs Station, a renovated retail center the county purchased to house Cobb's community development agency. It will also later serve as Cobb's senior services facility. The county is expected to spend $2.8 million for the purchase and renovation of the building, and Quigley said the county hopes to sell the current senior services properties in the near future to help offset that cost.

The county's new public safety record management system, which Cobb Police Chief John Houser said will vastly change and improve the department's ticketing and data system, is also included in the 2011 proposed capital projects budget at a cost of $807,971.

The majority of the general fund budget, almost 71 percent, goes toward paying county employees' salaries and employment taxes and benefits. Salaries consume $155,864,058 of the county's proposed $328,259,554 budget, and taxes and benefits make up $75,632,168 for a total of $231,496,226. The cost of taxes and benefits in 2011 is expected to increase by 6.38 percent in 2011, though the cost of salaries goes down 4.21 percent for an almost 1 percent drop in total personal services costs to the county from 2010 to 2011.