Demorest Reverses Course and Approves $5,000 Growth-Partnership Invoice

Demorest City Council unanimously approved a motion March 4, 2025, to pay a $5,000 2025 invoice for Habersham Partnership for Growth, settling a renewal-related expense that the council had left pending three months earlier. The 4-0 vote authorized payment of the invoice and marked a change from the council’s December decision to table it rather than act on it.

The decision concerns whether Demorest would continue participating in an economic-development partnership and spend city money on that relationship. Although $5,000 is a limited municipal expense, the matter required a public council decision about continuing the arrangement. By approving the invoice in March, council moved beyond the earlier postponement and recorded its support for paying the 2025 charge.

The issue first came before the council Dec. 3, 2024, when Mayor Harkness said the $5,000 invoice would continue Demorest’s relationship with Habersham Partnership for Growth. A councilman said he had questions for partnership representatives, prompting a motion to table the invoice. Council approved that delay 4-0. When the invoice returned as a 2025 payment item on March 4, the council unanimously voted to pay it, also 4-0.

Council’s recorded position changed from deferring the decision in December to supporting payment in March, with unanimous votes on both actions. The councilman who sought to delay the first vote indicated that he wanted to question Habersham Partnership for Growth representatives before the city proceeded. Mayor Harkness described the invoice as a means of continuing the city’s relationship with the partnership. The minutes do not identify the substance of the councilman’s questions or any response from partnership representatives.

The March motion to pay the 2025 $5,000 invoice is a completed council action, documented as passing 4-0; the earlier December tabling is likewise completed and no longer leaves the authorization unresolved. The minutes establish approval of payment, but they do not independently document when payment was issued or detail any benefits, obligations or answers connected to the partnership. They also provide no fuller account of the December questions beyond the councilman’s wish to ask representatives about them.

The immediate public decision on the 2025 invoice has been made: council approved payment. Residents seeking to track the relationship’s future should watch Demorest City Council agendas and approved minutes for a later invoice, renewal discussion or other action involving Habersham Partnership for Growth. What remains undecided in these minutes is not the March authorization, but the terms, results and any future continuation of the partnership beyond that 2025 invoice.