Friday, November 17, 2006
The board may revisit putting a bond issue before voters for a sports complex.
By SEAN BARRON
VINDICATOR CORRESPONDENT
NORTH JACKSON -- The Jackson-Milton Board of Education announced the introduction of two renewal levies to be placed on the May 1 primary election ballot.
School officials said at their meeting Thursday that a five-year emergency renewal levy would bring to the district about 989,000 annually for employees salaries, wages and benefits as well as other operating expenses.
Also to appear on the ballot is a five-year 0.9 mill permanent improvement levy slated to bring in roughly 90,000 a year. That money would go toward building repairs, Superintendent Buck Palmer said.
The millage for the operating levy is still being worked out, but likely will be around 5.8 mills, Treasurer John Zinger noted. Zinger stressed that neither levy will mean new taxes for residents, adding that both levies were last renewed in 2003
Board members said they were looking to recruit people to volunteer to get the word out about the levies.
Back burner
Palmer said that school officials have "put on the back burner" a 1-mill bond issue that was defeated in the Nov. 7 general election. The issue would have brought in 2.7 million to be used to construct a sports complex that was to include an all-weather track, a press box and fields for soccer and football. The complex would have been built near a 13.5 million Jackson-Milton High School/Middle School on property the district owns between Mahoning Avenue and Interstate 76.
The board may revisit the bond issue, but the renewal levies are board members' main priority, Palmer said.