The Clarke County Board of Education is scheduled to vote tonight on a nearly 150 million dollar budget for next year.
According to Larry Hammell, the chief financial officer of the CCSD, most of the district’s budget goes to pay salaries and benefits for district personnel.
“About 87 percent of [the Clarke County School District’s] expenditures are on salaries and benefits. Because we teach students, it takes a large amount of teachers and staff to do that,” Hammell said, “We put about another million, almost a million and a half dollars back into the schools for additional teachers and positions to help support the students. Anytime that we can put money back into the schools, that helps us lower the class size of the schools.”
Another large expenditure for Clarke County is special education.
“A lot of people migrate to our county and use SPED services. Because of that, we spend in excess of 10 million dollars a year just on teachers alone for SPED services,” Hammell said.
While the millage rate will remain at 20 mils, some property owners in Athens-Clarke County may see a tax increase. Under Georgia law, the millage rate automatically slides to a lower level every fiscal year if property values in a county increase, in order to yield the same amount of money at a lower tax rate. However, the Board of Education is empowered to keep the millage rate constant, and this proposed budget provides for that. The district estimates that a home valued at $175,000 could see a tax increase of just over $51 per year if the property valuation increased at a normal level.
“Even though we are not raising the millage rate, some people may see an increase in their property tax,” Hammell said, “The tax increases we have seen over the last several years have been mostly due to the reassessment of either private property or company property.”
Hammell also says that FY19 is the first time in several years that the district has produced a balanced budget.
The Clarke County Board of Education meets tonight at 7:30 at the HT Edwards building on Dearing Extension.
