School calls election to increase tax rate
by Dolores Hamilton
No residents of the Iowa Park school district were present at a called meeting of the school board Tuesday night that included public hearings on the budget for 2008-09 and on the proposed tax rate for 2008.

Superintendent Jerry Baird told board members that the budget, with expenditures of $14,511,855, carries a 1.3 percent increase over last year. “We are stressing the need to conserve travel,” he said. “The main increases are for fuel and electricity, and the only capital outlay expenditures are for a handicap bus and maintenance pickup.” The budget also includes step raises for teachers and three percent raises for all other staff.

After a budget workshop, school trustees asked that the following expenditures be added to the budget: Substitutes pay increase - $7,000; salary contingency - $48,000; mileage rate increase; and middle school equipment.

Total revenues are $14,068,053, leaving a shortfall of $443,802. With escalating costs, several of the trustees were concerned that the deficit could possibly double next year and favored a 13-cent hike in the tax rate.

The board voted unanimously to adopt the budget for school year 2008 - 09, and voted 5-1 to adopt the higher tax rate, with Guy Traylor, Robert Johnson, Mike Lehman, Kari Collins and Jeff Watts voting for, and Steve Fairchild voting against. Board member Jeff Nolen was absent.

The trustees also voted to call an election, required by the state, for voters to approve the higher tax rate. The vote was set for the general election Nov. 4.

Voter approval will raise the maintenance and operations portion of the school district’s tax rate from $1.04 to $1.17 per $100 evaluation of property, and the rate for interest and sinking would remain the same at eight-cents, bringing the total tax rate to $1.25 per $100 of property value.

In other business, the board approved a resolution explaining intent to exceed or fall short of proposed expenditure targets established by the Commissioner of Education.

Each school district is required to expend at least 65 percent of its proposed budget on classroom instruction. Due to increases in fuel and utility costs in this year’s budget, the spending percentage will be under the required 65 percent. A resolution to the fact that the school board realizes and acknowledges this is required.

The School Board Policy was updated, with the trustees setting the check-writing limit by IPCISD officers at a maximum of $25,000 without co-signatures of board officers, and the mileage reimbursement was set at 58.5, and meal reimbursement at $36 a day.

The board also approved the amended budget for 2007 - 08.