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Gainesville, Hall County unlikely to consolidate
City says it has no intent of pursuing merger with county
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As it turns out, a discussion about uniting can be pretty divisive.That seems to be the case with the Hall County Board of Commissioners’ most recent overtures about a consolidation between Hall County government and the city of Gainesville.After a proposal from Commissioner Craig Lutz to engage the city in talks about merging governments, the commission agreed to informally approach Gainesville City Council.Each commissioner spoke in favor of considering some form of consolidation — either through cooperation on specific services or merging the entire governments — as a way to improve services and save taxpayers money.It’s not the first time the idea has come up.There’s a long history of chatter about merging Hall County and its largest city. Attempts to move beyond talk have been unsuccessful to date, and the latest revival of the topic isn’t beginning well, either.Despite the commissioners’ attempts to diplomatically engage the city, the City Council has been fairly blunt about their disinterest.“It will be a one-sided conversation with the county doing the only talking,” Mayor Danny Dunagan told The Times.At this point, city officials say they don’t see what they would gain from consolidation. The city also resubmitted a letter to commissioners, which was originally written almost a year ago as the county was discussing consolidation on the eve of a difficult budget process.The city’s letter, dated April 28, 2011, and signed by every City Council member, doesn’t mince words.