Lowndes County School District board members have decided to postpone a district-wide vote on a bond issue expected to be worth $39.9 million.
The school board had previously aimed to put the bond issue on a ballot on Feb. 3. On Friday, however, the board voted unanimously in executive session to indefinitely postpone the county-wide vote, citing the need to pinpoint the details of the bond and educate the public on the matter.
The LCSD board decided to hold a work session meeting during the week of Jan. 19-23 to finalize plans for the bond and decide a date to put it on the ballot.
“We’ll have more information when we have our work session,” LCSD superintendent Lynn Wright said after Friday’s meeting. “We’ll have our tax clerk give us a report on projected revenues and everything like that, so we can make a more informed decision.”
The bond in question is a reduced version of a $47 million bond rejected at the polls Aug. 26. That bond won 52 percent of the vote, but not the 60 percent needed to be approved.
Wright told The Dispatch he is confident this bond will pass. He said community members have been asking him when the bond issue will be on the ballot again.
The $39.9 million bond is expected to include $25 million for a new New Hope High School, $11 million for a centralized career-tech center, $2 million for a new athletic field house in Caledonia and around $1 million in upgrades for the West Lowndes campus.
“It’s an opportunity to get our students into some updated buildings that will be much more environmentally friendly,” Wright said, pointing out that some New Hope buildings date to the mid-1950s.
A centralized career-tech center would help unify the district, he said. Right now, students can only enroll in career-tech programs offered at the high school they attend.
“If we can get a centralized career-tech center built we can offer about twice as many courses as we offer now, and we can offer those courses to all the students in Lowndes County,” Wright said.
LCSD is one of two districts in the state without a centralized career-tech center, Wright said, adding that Lowndes County is number one in the state in industrial development.
“The state department wants to work with us on it. EMCC will work with us on it,” Wright said of the career-tech center. “We can have the kids prepared to enter the workforce or for more advanced training at EMCC or a four-year institution.”
The financial details of the bond will be finalized in the work session meeting later this month, but Wright is confident it will be affordable for the county.
“All indications show there will be no tax increase,” Wright said. “It’s something we can do for our students. We can get the career-tech center built and afford them some great opportunities with all the industry we have in Lowndes County and what is projected to be coming in, to provide them with an opportunity for a great future.”
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