GREENE: Carrollton continues to get huge Penny Sales Tax checks

By Editor | December 28, 2022 |

By Carmen Ensinger

Even with the major loss of business in the last couple of years, including the Kroger stores in both White Hall and Carrollton, Evans Ford and Oasis Bar and Grill, the Carrollton School District continues to get some substantial monies from the Penny Sales Tax that was implemented several years ago specifically to help school districts.
Carrollton Superintendent Mark Halwachs informed the board at the Dec. 19 board meeting that the check for November is once again up over $20,000. In fact, the November check is $20,207.
“It is back up pretty significantly over where it had been in the last few months, which is a pretty good trend I think,” he said. “I predict that the December and January check will be nice as well and I think the one after that as well.”
In order that all schools, regardless of the business climate in their own community, will receive a fair share of the tax, the tax is based on the number of students in the district.
While the last couple months the district has seen a decrease in the amount of tax it received, the holidays have seen an uptick in purchases. The higher gas prices also helped increase the total sales in the county from which the districts would draw from the tax.
Halwachs said he received a call from a member of the Greene County Economic Development Group (GCEDG) asking if the district would write a letter of support for the proposed county-wide broadband project they are trying to secure $1.1 million in funding for.
While he said the district would be happy to write a letter in support of the project, their second request he didn’t think they would be able to comply with.
“They then asked us if we would be willing to use E-rate funds to help them come up with the matching funds that they need,” Halwachs said.
Frontier Communications has agreed to come in and run fiber optic internet to every home and business in Greene County – a $93 million dollar project and are asking for a local match of only $1.1 million in funding.
The GCEDG are going around to all of the municipalities, townships, school districts and businesses trying to secure this funding before the end of January.
They have also contacted North Greene and Greenfield school districts and are wanting all three school districts to use E-rate Funding to help make up this $1.1 million they have to raise.
“After I received the call, I called an E-rate consultant because I told the person who called me that I didn’t think we could use these funds for this,” Halwachs said. “I said my understanding is when we use these funds, it has to be to bring broadband in for schools and libraries.”
The E-rate program is administered by the Universal Service Administrative Company under the direction of the FCC. Its purpose is to help schools and libraries to obtain affordable broadband.
“I was on the phone with the consultant for about 30 minutes and they said that definitely you cannot use E-rate funds for something like this,” Halwachs said. “It is for bringing broadband to schools and libraries only – not to private homes and businesses. So, as of now we will write a letter of support and if there is anything else the district can do to support the project, we will gladly do that.”
Board member Vicki Schnelten said she had been contacted by individuals who wanted to come and make a presentation.
“They are giving the presentation at North Greene and at the different municipalities and I think it would be kind of nice to hear what they have to say,” she said. “I told them we probably wouldn’t have any funds.”
Halwachs said that would be fine.
“I don’t have an issue with that,” he said. “I’m not opposed to trying to write for some grants since it will benefit our community and the county.
The district had their initial tax levy presentation at the November meeting before passage this month.
“This will be the best levy the district has had in years, by far,” Halwachs said. “It is projected that state funding will go up this year and next year and the year after that it will stagnate a little. They are projecting after that it will start to go down a little.”