JOUR 3010 Article 2

SPLOST dollars at work for the Cartersville School System

by Morgan Scroggs

The Cartersville School System is enjoying its third consecutive receipt of SPLOST revenue since 1997. Although, according to Finance Chairman Kelley Dial, the February 2012 collection – which was distributed in March and reviewed in the April school board meeting – “is still down a bit from what we have gotten used to.”

Dial reported to the board that the system received $371,834.22 in March, also indicating that the revenue from SPLOST during the month was below what the school had budgeted for.

“We are now over 100 percent of what we budgeted,” said Dial.

Dial also said that the tax collections continued to go very well. “We are very pleased with that,” she said. Currently, the Cartersville School System averages $394,000 a month in SPLOST revenue and has budgeted $325,000 – leaving the system well enough to pay down bonds, according to Dial.

SPLOST revenue is voted for on a per-county basis, allowing the taxpayers of a community to add up to a 2 percent increase on sales tax. For 15 years, Bartow county and the Cartersville School System have enjoyed the benefits of improving education through the generosity of the taxpayers.

From 1997 to 2002, SPLOST revenue helped the Cartersville School System pay off five years of bond debt, buy new equipment and expand classrooms, revamp the elementary school lunchroom and media, as well as buy new buses and system vehicles. Similar improvements occurred from 2002 to 2007, with the addition of the Cartersville High School renovation and another five years of bond debt paid.

On its list for 2007 – 2013, the system includes improvements to security, a multipurpose classroom and fine arts area for the middle school, and plans for future schools (including the purchase of land).