The Knoxville school board is considering the purchase of around $350,000 in working cash bonds to purchase air conditioning for Mable Woolsey Elementary School.
A required hearing of public comment was held last night to purchase the bonds.
No public comments were made so the board briefly discussed the purpose of selling the bonds and the next step of the process.
Next Monday Feb. 22 is when the board will vote to approve the selling of the bonds.
Superintendent Steve Wilder says part of the reason this is being done now is the the threat of a state wide property tax freeze and possibly caps.
He tells WGIL if that were to happen it would seriously hamper the district’s ability to generate revenue through property taxes and increasing their debt service limit was one option to give districting funding assurance.
“It kind of protects the district in the event of needing to borrow money down the road if we set the limit at a reasonable,” Wilder says. “But we didn’t just want to do that for no reason so that idea came up.”
Mable Woolsey is the last school in the district without air conditioning..
“If we can install air conditioning this summer, which is the plan, we would give our staff and students a better environment to work in,’ says Wilder.
The new Knoxville High School is air conditioned and the junior high has been cooled since it was built in the late 70’s.
