While the Augusta Commission already approved the sales tax package and bond issue going on the May 20 ballot and 937 voters already have cast advance votes on the measure, commissioners spent much of a Tuesday meeting seeking answers about the hastily assembled package.

Al Dallas, the executive assistant to Mayor Deke Co­pen­ha­ver, revealed details about the purpose of about $5.25 million in sales tax dollars going to the mills campus proposal, to be funded up-front using the bond issue.

Dallas said the intent of Copenhaver’s Augusta Regional Collaborative was to use the funds to acquire land in Harrisburg and surrounding Sibley and King mills to create a campus contiguous with Georgia Regents University property just across Butt Bridge.

Dallas said the collaborative plans to respond to a request for proposals from the University System Board of Regents to construct 600 dormitory rooms for GRU by July 2016, and referred to a Regents request for public-private partnerships to create the housing.

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