Faced with a projected $1.3 million deficit, South Pike School District officials plan to vote Thursday on a $17.2 million budget that could prompt a record-high millage rate for the coming year.
During a budget hearing this past Tuesday, the board’s CPA consultant, Bonnie Granger, and business manager Delorean Hall proposed a 4-percent increase in ad valorem property taxes for the coming year.
Granger predicted the millage increase would be a small amount.
However, Pike County administrator Andrew Alford said based on preliminary numbers, a 4 percent tax increase could increase the millage rate by an estimated 1.2 mills, bringing the total to a record high of 56.25 mills.
The school board’s finance team was quick to point out that county officials control the millage rate.
“We don’t do the mills,” Hall said.
Though the district doesn’t set millage, it adopts a budget, and county supervisors must adjust the millage rate to fund the request by the district as well as other factors such as assessed property value.
Granger estimated that the tax increase would only generate about $150,000, hardly making a dent in the deficit and only covering about 40 percent of new recurring expenses. She said the district was expecting a reimbursement of about $600,000 for programs instituted last year.
At $17.2 million, total projected revenues are down slightly from last year. But expenses are projected to be $18.5 million — $800,000 more than last year.
Granger said that’s largely due to an increase in retirement benefits.
Granger, whom the district began contracting with after Hall took the business manager’s job, said South Pike had been expecting more funding from the state to cover an increase in contributions to the Public Employees Retirement System.
Instead, South Pike will lose about $6,000 from the Mississippi Adequate Education Program.
Yet, spending cuts do not seem likely.
“We’ve already cut out four or five positions and pushed class sizes up so it wouldn’t be any worse than it is,” Granger said.
Salary expenses for the coming year are projected to increase by about $61,000, and property and liability insurance premiums are increasing by about $126,000.
Board member Dr. Luke Lampton said he is not a fan of a tax increase.
“I’m really unsure if we should increase any burden on the taxpayers,” Lampton said. “That said, the state has been cutting what they’re paying us, and the federal government has been cutting what they’re paying us.
“I think South Pike is trying to spend their money in an appropriate fashion,” he said. “But the people of (the district) already pay a huge amount of taxes.”
Projected revenues include roughly $4.6 million from local sources, $8.8 million from the state, $3.7 million from federal sources and $130,000 from 16th Section sources.
As for projected expenditures, $8.4 million will go to instruction, $8.5 million to support services and $1.1 million to non-instructional services. Sixteenth Section expenses are about $28,000, and total debt services amount to $440,000.
The board will meet 4 p.m. Thursday at the Braswell Education Complex in Magnolia to decide on the budget.
