Rachel Brown
rachelbrown@daltoncitizen.com
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Taxpayers won’t see a rate hike to fund Whitfield County Schools, but they also won’t see their dollars go as far as before.
With the expectation of drawing $25 million from local property tax collections — about $2.6 million less than last year — Board of Education members on Monday voted to announce their intention to keep the property tax rate at $14.76 per $1,000 of value. Officials said the loss in revenue, which is based on projections, is $600,000 to $1.5 million more than they anticipated, but they expect to be able to absorb it with the school district’s fund balance, which was $6.8 million at the start of the fiscal year. The final vote on the property tax rate is expected during a meeting on Monday, Sept. 13, at 6:30 p.m. at the school system’s central office.
“We are not willing to pass on state neglect from the Legislature and the under funding of the (formula used to determine how much state money school systems receive) to the local taxpayer,” said board Chairman Tim Trew.
The board, with member Jerry Nealey absent, approved keeping the tax rate the same as it has been since 2008 when it brought in $27.9 million and in 2009 when it brought in $27.6 million. Superintendent Danny Hayes said school system personnel’s “tremendous job” of projecting the local funding decrease played a role in allowing the tax rate to remain the same.
Chief Financial Officer Kenny Sheppard said the school system earlier this year budgeted for an expected 8 percent decrease in the local tax base, but it came in as a 9.47 percent decrease.
“I’ll be honest with you, it was tough,” Sheppard said, adding he worked with the county tax assessor’s office in making the projections. “We thought 8 percent at the time was extremely conservative.”
The school system is expected to lose $822,000 because of property being assessed at lower values, $329,000 because of a 20 percent freeport tax break on business inventories and $55,000 because of an increase in the number of exemptions property owners are taking. The system is expected to lose another $1.4 million due to a reduction of inventory, machinery and automobile values not associated with a reassessment.
In May, board members approved cutting $13.4 million to reach a budget of $94.5 million. To do that, they scaled back several programs, cut more than 100 jobs and issued furloughs for all employees, with higher-paid employees generally having more furloughs than lesser-paid employees.
One major reason for the budget reductions of the last two years are state funding cuts — about $30 million from 2003 to 2010. Officials on Monday didn’t identify any additional reductions, but Sheppard said the school system will continue to look for ways to save.
“We’ll have to continue to tighten our belts and look for opportunities to preserve what we have in our budget,” he said.
What’s not known is what officials will do when the current fiscal year ends on June 30, 2011, and there is only $1.7 million left in the fund balance. Monthly operating expenses are close to $7.9 million. If needed, the school board could issue a tax anticipation note and take out a short-term, low-interest loan to help bridge that gap until tax collections come in.
“I think it is premature to assume that we will need a tax anticipation note next fiscal year; however, if the budget proves to be 100 percent accurate, then a tax anticipation note would be a possibility,” Sheppard said.
Trew said that decision will fall to next board, including three newly elected members who take office in January.
“Our budget is a good budget,” said Trew, who ended up not running for re-election after initially qualifying for the race. “... Next year won’t be my ball to carry.”
