The Hall County Board of Education has approved a tentative budget for the upcoming fiscal year, and board members have set three public comment meetings for next month, despite the fact the board anticipates a slight dip in the millage rate. State law requires at least two public comment periods on a budget.
School District Superintendent Will Schofield told board members the financial staff had worked on some figures to reduce the gap in revenues and expenditures from the first draft of the budget.
"It was approaching $6 million," Schofield said. "We have worked on expenditures as well as some revenue figures. We also have moved $700,000 of bus purchases out of the general fund into the ESPLOST fund."
The changes will reduce the gap to around $4 million, meaning the board will not have to dig as deep into reserve funds to balance the FY 2018 budget. In addition, Schofield told board members he plans to manage the budget in such a way that the district will not have to dip even that deep into the reserve.
"We will work as hard as we possibly can next year - as we always do - to underspend expectations and hopefully, we'll be able to bring that to within a couple of million dollars by the end of the year," Schofield said.
The $265.1 million budget includes pay raises for school district employees.
Public hearings for the budget are scheduled for June 12 at 5 p.m. and for June 26 at 11:30 a.m. and 6 p.m.
To see complete budget documents, follow this link to the Hall County School District website's finance page.
