Muhlenberg residents have filed a petition this week to block a tax the County School Board passed in January to help the school system with its deficit.
The Muhlenberg County Clerk’s Office received about 3,200 unverified signatures. Only 1,294 verified signatures are needed to get the issue on the November ballot.
County Board of Education Finance Officer Eric Bletzinger says the three percent utility tax would raise an estimated $1.5 million each year, which is needed to help with a more than $5 million deficit.
“The TVA revenues are decreasing and have been decreasing,” he said. “We’ve gone from about $10.2 million to $8.2 million this year to $5.7 next year.”
Bletzinger says that revenue is expected to continue dropping, and has an impact the largest portion of the budget: staffing and salary.
“It’s cut our budget significantly, and I’ve got about 85 percent of my budget goes to staffing and salary,” he said. “And so the reduction in revenue leaves less to run the district on.”
Bletzinger says the school board has already voted on reducing pay for all school district staff 8 percent and that non-tenured teachers will not be able to return next year.
