(UPDATED) Northside Elementary to Host Benefit Yard Sale for Teacher Ginger Wenger

May 9, 2019
By: Dwayne Page

(THE FOLLOWING EVENT HAD BEEN SCHEDULED FOR THIS SATURDAY, MAY 11 BUT HAS BEEN POSTPONED UNTIL MAY 18 DUE TO WEATHER)

Northside Elementary School will be hosting a benefit yard sale in honor of Ms. Ginger Wenger, who is battling cancer, Saturday, May 18, from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. 100% of the proceeds will go to help Ms. Wenger cover her medical expenses.

If you would like to donate items, you may drop them off Friday, May 17 from 4:00 p.m. until 7:00 p.m. or Saturday morning from 7:00 a.m. until the time of the event beginning at 9:00 a.m. Again, the date is Saturday, May 18 from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m. If you prefer to make a direct donation, you can drop off a check made payable to Ms. Ginger Wenger at the yard sale.

May 9, 2019
By: Dwayne Page

DeKalb County educators and support staff are a step closer to getting a pay raise.

During a meeting Wednesday evening, the budget committee of the county commission voted 3-0 to approve as presented the Board of Education’s proposed spending plan for the 2019-2020 fiscal year.

Committee Chairman Dennis Slager and members Jerry Adcock and Jeff Barnes voted in favor. Members Sabrina Farler and Anita Puckett could not vote on the school budget with the proposed pay raises because of their conflict of interest as employees of the school district.

The school budget will now be recommended for passage by the entire county commission later this summer.

The school board plans to fund a local pay raise for the district’s 225 teachers by $1,200 each and that coupled with a state raise of $800 per teacher would put their overall increase at $2,000 for the coming year. The 200 non-certified staff members would each get a $600 local pay raise.

The total costs of the local pay raises comes to almost $400,000. Although the Board of Education will have to find the money in the school budget to pay for local raises the county will be adding $227,000 in new money to the school system to meet the local matching requirements of the state’s BEP program funding formula for schools. That extra $227,000 in local money for schools equates to a four cent increase in the local property tax rate. The budget committee has not yet decided whether to recommend passing that four cent increase onto the taxpayers or to pay for it from the county general’s capital projects fund.

In his meeting with the county budget committee Wednesday evening, Director of Schools Patrick Cripps said the pay raises will hopefully help keep good teachers from leaving for other better paying districts. Although no one else addressed the committee, members of the Board of Education and several teachers filled the meeting room in a show of support for the school budget and the pay raises.

“Our system weighted average (teacher) salary is $43,000 from the state. The state average is $46,369 so we’re roughly $3,600 below the state average. While we recognize this as a huge gap in trying to overcome, we are requesting to take steps to try to meet that salary (state average). We’re not asking to go beyond the state we’re just trying to keep up at this point. We are losing good teachers to larger systems each year. I think DeKalb County is a great place to live and I wouldn’t want to go anywhere else but I was born and raised here. Twenty years ago a majority of our staff was rooted in DeKalb County. Today that is not the case. There are fewer people going into education so the demand for teachers is great and the bigger systems are able to come in and hire at higher salaries with better benefits to get those teachers. We’re fighting to keep what we have,” said Director Cripps.

The Board of Education plans to purchase Chrome Books for the 3rd through 5th grades for the new school year. Students from the 6th grade through high school already have Chrome Books. One new bus is usually purchased each year. The board plans to buy two buses next year along with a new work truck for the maintenance department. The total cost of the buses would be around $220,000. No new money would be needed to fund the extra bus, the work truck, or the Chrome Books. Sufficient funds can be shifted within the line items of the school budget to pay for them.

A total of $50,000 has been budgeted as incentive pay for teachers. According to Director Cripps, the money would be distributed as a bonus or reward money among deserving educators for going above and beyond their duties, such as writing grants, etc.

Substitute teachers would get an additional $2.00 a day and a $10,000 increase has been budgeted for contracted services to purchase the Skyward on-line system, which the district has been using for several years, to report attendance data to the state. It’s also useful for parents to keep with their children’s grades. The district will be reimbursed by the state for the purchase cost.

The proposed 2019-20 school budget comes to $24,235,000 including an expected increase in state BEP funding of almost $600,000.

May 9, 2019
By: Dwayne Page

Area postal carriers are gearing up for the 27th annual National Association of Letter Carriers and Rural Carriers Food Drive on May 11.

The food drive, held annually on the second Saturday in May, is part of the “Stamp Out Hunger” national effort that has been an annual event since 1993. It is one of America’s great days of giving, collecting over 71.6 million pounds of food nationally and feeding over 64 million people.

The Smithville Post Office is again participating in the annual food drive and a cart is in the lobby of the post office this week where you may drop off your donation.

Residents are urged to leave non-perishable food at their mailboxes for letter carriers to pick up when they deliver the mail on Saturday, May 11.

Letter carriers will be collecting non-perishable food donations for the drive from postal customers in the Smithville area as they deliver mail along their postal routes. People are encouraged to leave a sturdy bag containing non-perishable foods such as canned soup; canned vegetables; canned meats and fish; pasta; peanut butter; rice or cereal next to their mailbox before the regular mail delivery on Saturday, May 11.

Carriers will bring the food to local food banks, pantries or shelters in DeKalb County.