The AJC reports this morning that in the process of “theoretically” balancing their coming year budget, the DeKalb School Board took the idea of closing Fernbank Science Center off the table. Two petitions to save the Center made the rounds over the past week after residents received word that DeKalb School’s budget committee had proposed closing a $73 million budget deficit.
To see what the Board ultimately decided to do to help bridge the divide, click over to the AJC article.
Photo courtesy of Trip Advisor
From the AJC article:
On Tuesday, board members took the Fernbank closure off the table. In an unofficial poll, they also scrapped the idea of saving $330,000 by eliminating middle school sports and saving $5 million by outsourcing custodians. They added cuts to health and dental insurance subsidies for employees for a savings of nearly $7 million, agreed to eliminate 200 teachers’ aides for another $7 million and supported cutting the school system’s pre-kindergarten program expenditures of $2.7 million.
The article also says the hole will be filled by (i) tax increases, (ii) furlough days, and (iii) increasing student-teacher ratios.
Huh? They’re unwilling to outsource custodial services to save $5 million, and I didn’t see any mention of serious cuts to central office admin bloat, but they’re cutting teachers’ aides, pre-K expenditures, plus instituting the items above. DeKalb’s go-to solutions seem to involve cutting core educational expenditures first. Really messed up.
Really messed up indeed. But I’m torn. I feel bad for all the people with kids in DeKalb County Schools. On the other hand I’m pretty sure that our house’s value, a few hundred yards within the COD/CSD limits, went up 25% overnight with this news.
J_T, I feel bad for the kids in Dekalb, but many of the “the people with kids” are part of the problem as they won’t replace the school board and/or demand these cuts not come from core educational expenditures (to borrow TOK’s description). I do feel bad for the people with kids who get it, but are unable to outvote the masses and effect any real change.
Mainly I feel bad for the kids who are being harmed by the cowardice and stupidity of their school officials. For me right now, the upside of increased property values will mean just having a higher valuation and taxes. But one genuine upside is that well-functioning school districts like CSD will be extremely attractive to great teachers and other professionals. I heard that there were over 300 applicants recently for a 1st-grade teacher opening at Oakhurst. If DCSS keeps crapping all over its teachers, they’re going to have trouble attracting and retaining good staff, even in this terrible economy.
“I’m pretty sure that our house’s value . . .went up 25% overnight”
Decaturites should understand that given the city’s location in the heart of the county, the fate of Decatur (and its property values) is ultimately tied to what occurs in DeKalb.
That’s a tough case to make to those of us who are the lucky recipients of new tax assessments. (Mine came today. Yikes.)
I’m wondering what you meant by “Yikes.” Was that “Yikes, my house is now worth a lot more!” or “Yikes, my house is now worth a lot less?”
Yikes, my house is worth a lot more if I want to sell it, and YIKES, it’s costing me more every year to stay in it. Classic good news-bad news.
I wish the county assessments corresponded to the actual retail. (Notice that I am saying “corresponded” vs. “equaled”!) But I don’t think there is a logical relationship, especially with what I’m hearing about this assessment.
This is a threadjack but an important one. Something strange has happened to many people’s property assessments. Word is getting out. Overall property values going up 20%-25% and then when you look online for the details (http://web.co.dekalb.ga.us/PropertyAppraisal/realSearch.asp), strange breakdowns where the building value has gone way down but the land value has gone way up, even more than the building value went down. Am hoping there’s a way to get this fixed for everyone instead of a property by property appeals process.
DM, can we get a reassessment thread? Like AHID, it looks like we also had a huge jump in land value and huge drop in building value. But I don’t necessarily have a problem with it because my overall assessment dropped 10%. Living inside the city limits, that’s a gift I’ll happily accept.
DM, please don’t start a reassessment thread. There is an appeals process for those taxpayers whose total assessment went up, and every single one of you should appeal as prices in Decatur haven’t arbitrarily increased by 25% since last year. Everyone whose assessment went down despite the very stranage and perhaps incorrect increase in land value but drop in building value, SSSSSSSSSHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH! The last thing we need to do is start a public debate complaining that our assessments went down by 10%.
DawgFan has a valid point, but…I wouldn’t mind if we had a thread so we could ask some questions (assuming people keep the complaints to a dull roar).
I have a few right off the bat:
1. What’s involved in a reassessment? Do they actually come out to look at your house?
2. Can a reassessment result in value going UP?
3. How does the dramatic shift in land/building value affect insurance?
Good questions. Here’s some more:
– What are land values based on? Is it just what neigboring parcels are worth or are improvements like landscaping factored in? I can’t fathom how our land value could have increased from 52% to 156% in one year, depending on whether one uses the listed or reversed data, when we have not done one thing to improve it, not even cut down a tree or plant anything. We’ve mown the grass, period.
– Is there an ulterior motive on the part of the county? On a neighborhood list serv, the suggestion has been made that there’s a logic to what looks like crazy assessments. If the land values are all equalualized at a higher level, it’s harder for an individual to appeal their particular assessment. And since the building values have all been lowered incredibly, no one dares appeal them because they will certainly go up in a fair assessment.
– If this is a gimmick to raise assessments without easy appeal, rather than based on true rises in property values, is there a way to collectively fight this?
Dawgfan, don’t fret. If DM does offer a reassessment thread and you aren’t interested in it or it bothers you in some way, you can easily avoid it by not reading it. Meanwhile, a bunch of us apparently are seeing some pretty crazy things on our new assessments, and I am with those who think a thread about it could be worthwhile if we could get answers to some fundamental questions about how the assessment is put together and what it’s supposed to mean. Mine went up quite a bit, even though properties around me did not, and my land/building values seem to be upside down although the arithmetic doesn’t indicate a simple coding flip-flop. Yes, there is an appeals process which (and many others, I expect) intend to use. Meanwhile, there are questions.
Not to be snarky STG, but please re-read my post and this time use your reading comprehension skills. How did you get that I would somehow be bothered by a thread on reassessments or disinterested? My point was clearly that we should not point these errors out to the county if the assessments do contain errors in our favor. And, in case this wasn’t clear, I was (half) kidding – there are several legitimate questions and concerns which need to be addressed, and this is a great forum to do so.
Ours went down over 30%. No appeal from me. Headed to Vegas.
33% here. Bellagio or Wynn?
Done. Sorry DawgFan, I’m getting slammed with emails about this. The changes are moving in both directions, so there’s little chance it’s an isolated “problem” for a few “lucky” owners like Scott and TeeRuss.
No worries. I knew there would be a thread about this on DM as soon as someone in my neighborhood emailed everyone yesterday asking if anyone else had received a huge reassessment and I logged onto the Dekalb Co. website to check my assessment. There are some legitimate questions which need answered, and hopefuly the lucky ones will remain lucky and the unlucky ones are able to successfully appeal.
Actually, I hope that the lucky ones don’t remain lucky. I understand why people whose assessments drop by 30% feel like they’ve won the lottery, but it isn’t fair for a few random people to pay way less in taxes than an accurate assessment of their property value would require just because of some weird random glitch. If you think that taxes are overall too high, fine, but then there ought to be a push for an overall reduction of rates so that everybody has their taxes reduced in an equitable way.
Huh. Went online and saw that this happened to us too: our overall assessment went up by about $33,000–a little more than 10%–but then in the breakdown, our land value went up by about $148,000, while our building value went down by about $115,000. Bizarre.
But my guess is that it’s just a simple coding error: if you swapped the land value and building value assessments for 2012, the land value would have gone up about $4000 (5% or so), and the building value about $29,000 (about 14%). Not that I’m overjoyed by the increase, but offhand it seems pretty reasonable–our assessment has been flat since at least 2008, and a little bit of an increase between then and now in the city of Decatur doesn’t seem too whacked out.
Switching the columns doesn’t make our assessment make sense either. The house value still goes down (we aren’t handy but we haven’t WRECKED the place) and the land value goes way, way up. (We aren’t in Oakhurst and the For Sale brochures on our street don’t indicate rising values.) My sense is that the county assessments in the City of Decatur are all over the place with no correspondence to the actual property. This is not making me have any more confidence in the County than in DCSS! I have never been a fan of cities breaking away from counties but I am beginning to understand why they do.
Custodians are off the table due to the many ties they have to DeKalb school administrators.
Fernbank Science Center never should have been on the table as an option to close their budget shortfall. It’s such an important institution and not just for Dekalb schools. It’s funny how everyone complains that we are so far behind in math and science (compared to other countries) but when there is a budget crisis, it’s the first thing they want to cut and it makes no sense. All their proposed budget cuts would only hurt the teachers and children who haven’t done anything to deserve it. They didn’t cause the budget shortfall, so why are they being punished?
I do feel for Dekalb county kids and parents. As a product of the Dekalb county school system it just makes me sad to see what it has degenerated into. Dekalb used to be a really good system and a model for others. Now it’s just a mess.
Actually, arts, music programs, foreign languages, and phys ed are generally the first things cut, but after THAT, yes, math and science. 😉
The quote that bothered me the most and is truly indicative of root causes is…
***The crisis was revealed earlier this month, when Superintendent Cheryl Atkinson said she and her staff were caught off guard by tens of millions of dollars in expenses that were not budgeted this year.***
So, once again, raising taxes (among other things) to make up for, and further encourage, the incompetence of others is their best answer? How about they start by firing the incompetents who aren’t aware they are spending millions of dollars they don’t have in the first place?
I know there is a meeting this evening. Can anyone share the location and specific time? I think it starts at 6 pm….
Nevermind….found it. I’m curious as to why the Board members aren’t taking cuts….
They aren’t taking cuts because they care more about their personal bottom lines than the school system’s. I honestly wonder sometimes if they even realize that their decisions are affecting thousands of children and teachers who are essentially powerless against the school board.
My understanding is that one Board member consideres their DCSS stipend to be their main source of income and health insurance. Not a good sign. A stipend is to compensate for time and effort spent, not to replace regular employment. And it’s not to be cut voluntarily if it’s providing the main source of income. Not sure if they are still doing it, but I give kudos to the City Schools of Decatur school board members for declining their stipends during the years that teacher salaries were frozen.
So, instead of doing work this afternoon, I pulled the proposed FY2012-2013 budget. Putting aside for the moment the “unanticipated” increase in fixed costs (including 15 million for….gasp, increased health/retirement costs….raise your hand if your health insurance has NOT increased EVERY year for the past five), the school board members budget for 2011-2012 was $3.7 million….this proposed budget? A whopping, unbelievable, slap to the face of every hardworking teacher and taxpaying homeowner $6.7 million.
From the AJC:
“Board member Tom Bowen introduced the proposal to increase taxes while cutting teachers and school days. He said the one mill increase should be rolled back by 2015.”
There is zero chance — zero — that Bowen is right about this. That one mil increase will be about as “temporary” as SPLOST, which has been renewed 4 consecutive times now, unless I am miscounting. Once a penny is given over to DCSS — oh sorry, I mean taken by force — it does not come back.
As it happens, I got a note from Wells Fargo just yesterday informing me that, in light of this year’s huge hike in DeKalb Co taxes, I have to write an additional check of $2,500 into my escrow account to cover my property taxes. It’s getting to the point that DeKalb is simply not worth it. In the last 6 months alone we have a 22 or so percent hike in county taxes, the extension of SPLOST to pay for “necessities” like astroturf, stadium lights, and the rebuilding of recently renovated schools, and now a one mil hike in store by DCSS. It never ends.
Meanwhile Cobb Co manages to somehow run its schools with roughly 1/3 the number of central office administrators per 1,000 students as we have in DeKalb. Meanwhile Gwinnet is doing the same. Meanwhile a $175,000 consultant report recommending reduced staffing and other cost savings is gathering dust — “we would never even consider” implementing many of their suggestions, in the words of a DCSS spokesperson. And why would DCSS consider it? It is far easier to increase the cost of owning a home in DeKalb. They get. We pay.
I would love to know what DCSS revenue line looks like over the past 12 years. Why do I feel like tax revenues probably exploded during the housing boom, DCSS spent every penny of that money, and now cries poverty by working from that inflated revenue baseline? Sounds like a research project when time permits.
You know what they SHOULD cut? That awful Cable TV show they do. It’s embarassingly bad, and the only reason they do it is to give Philandria Guillory something to do. The woman got her job because her mother was on the school board, she spent years doing almost no work, she’s unqualified for her job, and drawing a hefty salary. Why is her job not on the chopping block? Her mama isn’t on the school board anymore.
From the blog
http://dekalbschoolwatch.blogspot.com/2009/05/ways-schools-sneak-through-cranks-and.html
Francis Edwards is a former BOE member. She served District 5 for 4 terms, I believe. Jay Cunningham now holds this post.
“Mrs. Edwards attended Carver High School and Alabama State University. She and her husband Harold are residents of South DeKalb County and have two grown children. Their daughter Philandrea Guillory is the Director of Broadcast Media, and son Jamal Edwards is a Network Liaison Specialist in the DeKalb School System.”
Lo and behold – she is also a 1997 “graduate” of Leadership DeKalb.
My note – her daughter’s husband, David Gillory works in Transportation making $113,106.00
(Philandrea makes $12 less at $113,094.00).
Jamal makes $56,003.99 working in Instructional Support. That totals over $285, 000 going in the family coffer. Anyone else?
This was in 2009. There’s a quarter of a million dollars the board is spending for a FORMER board member’s family.
Diane, Philandrea actually pulls down a shade over $114,000. http://www.open.georgia.gov/sta/search.aud
This county is in shambles. I rue the day I bought a house here, 12 years ago. I should have stayed in Cobb. What’s wrong? Constant uncovering of “holes” in budgets. Last year our county taxes go up over 20%. Now the school board needs more $ to run a failing school system. A school system so bad, I have to pay higher taxes & send my daughter to private school. A school system that has one of the newest school buildings in the county (Avondale Middle) closed while other, older schools are over crowded. (On another note, that school should have never been built; it was built over area residents and the City of Avondale Estates objections. Over 85% of the students were bused in from as far away as Lithonia.) Why do the administrators of the system think they need significantly more admin personnel than neighboring systems? Vote these morons out of office.
Why not sell some of your excess property? For example Hooper Elementary on Memorial or sell Forest Hills or Midway? Both are finally going to be put to good use housing charter schools after years of appeals from parents; but why not sell those schools to the charters?
I don’t even want to get into our house being robbed twice. My neighbor’s house just getting robbed last month. This county is going to hell in a handbasket.
To top it all off, you want me to trust the government with another penny sales tax so you can mis-manage a multi-billion dollar transportation mega project? I don’t think so. Vote no on July 31. Or you will get more dollars down a rabbit hole. Do you all really think that one penny will fix rush hours around ATL. Get real and don’t vote to allocate more of your dollars to a failing government.
I don’t know much about Cobb other than the school board woes published/broadcast by the media. I do know about Gwinnett where I owned residential property for about 25 years and worked. Another corrupt elected official, Commissioner Shirley Lassiter bites the dust. According to interviews, her local record as mayor of Duluth was near spotless. Maybe you didn’t jump from the frying pan to the fire nor look for the green grass on the other side of the track. Maybe there’s more of “them” than we care to admit.
Power can be an evil aphrodisiac.