A capacity crowd attended the third and final public hearing held in conjunction with a tax increase proposed by the Lincoln County Board of Education. The Lincoln County Board of Education voted to set the 2008 millage rate at 14.877 mills at a called meeting held Tuesday, September 16.

The motion passed four-to-one, with Wayne Williford casting the opposing vote.

The revenues, which represent a 1.995-mill increase over last year, will be used to fund a budget of $13,106,748 for FY 2009.

Factors contributing to the increase include:

.. Cuts in state funds needed to pay salaries and benefits. Some of the raises were mandated either by Governor Sonny Perdue or the federal government.

.. State reductions in the QBE (Quality Basic Education) allotment and a decrease in funding due to an increase in the county's tax digest.

.. The addition of Social Security benefits for TRS (Teacher Retirement System) employees. With 100-percent participation, the estimated cost of these benefits for the last half of FY 2009 is approximately $267,000.

.. The rising costs of fuel, electricity, employee travel, and so forth.

In other business, Dr. Randall Edmunds, superintendent of schools, announced the Teachers of the Year for 2009. They are: Mollie Asbell, LCES; Ken Hayes, LCMS; and LuAnn Beale, LCHS.

The superintendent congratulated the new Teachers of the Year, while noting that the system-wide Teacher of the Year will be announced at the board's regular October meeting.

In further business, Dr. Edmunds informed the board that both LCHS and LCMS were recognized for academic achievement by State Superintendent of Schools Kathy Cox.

LCHS was one of the top 10 schools in the state showing improvement in physical science scores on the End-of-Course Test; whereas, the seventh-grade class at LCMS was recognized as one of the top 10 in the state demonstrating improvement on the science portion of the CRCT (Criterion-Referenced Competency Test).

The Superintendent Cox' Distinguished Achievement Awards honor schools with the highest achievement and the greatest improvement on state curriculum tests.

Prior to the meeting, a capacity crowd attended the third and final public hearing held in connection with the board's FY 2009 tax increase.

For the most part, it seemed as if those speaking out against the increase were in favor of the teachers' receiving Social Security benefits but felt that due to the economic climate, now is not the time.

Several reasons were cited by audience members for taking a cautionary approach toward the budget including:

.. The county's populace is decreasing.

.. The cost of cost of gas and oil gas has increased.

.. Inflation is at a 15-year high, and there are no jobs in sight.

.. The state and federal governments have "freezes" in place.

.. There were concerns over the actual cost of the new high school and the future of SPLOST (Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax), which will be used to fund the new building project.

.. There is no way of knowing what the state and federal governments will do in the future.

.. "The subdivisions are not coming," according to one member of the audience.

.. Senior citizens on fixed incomes are leaving the county due to the tax burden.

.. The teachers will be getting double retirement. "It's not fair for us to have to pay Social Security," stated an individual, speaking from the floor.

On the other side of the fence, it was argued that:

.. It would be tough to recruit quality teachers if the system did not offer Social Security benefits.

.. The longer the board waits, the worse it will get, with Social Security benefits for those, who have taught in systems offering the program, dropping each month.

.. Some teachers have been drastically hurt financially by the board's decision to opt out of Social Security nearly 30 years ago.

.. SPLOST revenues are holding steady.

.. Denying teachers Social Security will affect the quality of education as well as growth. "We need young people to grow," said Board Member Gail Remsen. "We can't get them here if we don't offer a quality education."

In his comments, Dr. Robert Williams, board chairman, said, "In defense of the board, we haven't raised the millage rate since 2005. We don't want to raise taxes now. If there were any way possible, we would like to lower them.

"We cut everything we could, except for student education. That's the most important thing. The education you get from this school over here is top of the line, and you don't get it for free.

"It's hard to have to raise taxes, but there are things the school system needs," Dr. Williams continued. "We've done everything we could to keep taxes at bay, but costs have increased. We've struggled with this more than I've seen us struggle with anything else. The board is divided as we speak."

The next regular meeting of the board of education will be held Tuesday, October 7, at 7 p.m. at the board office on Metasville Road.