Oak Ridge City Council tonight will discuss an agreement that could resolve a months-old dispute with the School Board over debt payments for the city’s $65 million high school renovation.
At issue is the amount of money the Oak Ridge school system should transfer to the city to help cover the payments. The dispute primarily centers on the use of money raised by a half-cent sales tax increase approved by Anderson County voters in 2006.
One school board member has argued that the schools have overpaid the city by $1.4 million, while others contend that the school system owes the city hundreds of thousands of dollars and must pay it.
In a local newspaper guest column Monday, Oak Ridge Mayor Tom Beehan said school officials have not yet agreed on how much to transfer to the city. If the transfer is insufficient, there could be “serious budget cuts,” Beehan said.
In a separate guest column in another newspaper, Oak Ridge Board of Education member Angi Agle predicted that neither side is likely to get everything they want.
The half-cent increase in Anderson County in 2006 came earlier than many local officials had expected, and it forced a new sales tax distribution formula for Oak Ridge, Clinton, and Anderson County schools, Beehan said.
The county tax increase followed a similar rate hike in Oak Ridge in 2004, when voters overwhelmingly agreed to raise the sales tax rate to help pay for the high school renovation.
Beehan said the language used on the 2004 Oak Ridge ballot “will rule” in officials’ efforts to resolve the current disagreement over the debt payments.
Today’s special City Council meeting starts at 7 p.m. in the Multipurpose Room of the Central Services Complex on Woodbury Lane.
Council will also receive a briefing on a proposed penalty settlement with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, which has ordered Oak Ridge to repair all sewer system overflows by 2015. Oak Ridge City Attorney Ken Krushenski was not available for comment late Monday afternoon, but he has previously said the proposed settlement amount has been significantly reduced.
Angi Agle says
The fact that the schools have already overpaid by $1.3M isn’t really the issue; the Board isn’t asking for that money back, or even to apply it to current or future payments. The issue is that we’re willing to transfer — each year — the schools’ portion of the half-cent generated in Oak Ridge, as was approved in the 2004 referendum, while some want more.
We just have to have a written agreement approved by both sides first. Then the schools will transfer the money due.
John Huotari says
Thanks for the clarification, Angi.
Trina Baughn says
In May 2011 the BOE declared they didn’t owe anything further. Then, in February they changed their tune and admitted that they did owe the full amount. In recent weeks the story changed again to “we owe something, just not everything.” Now you are saying that the city actually owes you money. Hysterical. I call B.S. :
http://trinabaughn.com/2012/04/24/i-call-b-s/