Annexation Clarification: You Pay For The School Your Kids Attend
Decatur Metro | December 22, 2014 | 8:30 amOne item referenced by both the city and CSD during the recent Annexation Master Plan approval, specified that city schools wouldn’t need to provide educational services to students in the annexed areas until 18 months after the effective annexation date.
This has led to a few comments here in the last week where folks have worried that any such delay in adding students to the City Schools of Decatur school system would mean that they would be paying Decatur school taxes, while continuing to send their kids to DeKalb County Schools.
So I followed up with Decatur City Manager Peggy Merriss, who verified that this wasn’t the case. She writes…
As I understand it, taxpayers would continue to pay property taxes to the appropriate school system where they are enrolled.
For example, if the annexation was effective on December 31, 2015, then for school year beginning July 1, 2016 students in the annexation area would continue to attend DeKalb County schools and taxpayers would pay DeKalb County school taxes in two installments in 2016 (usually due in late August and mid November). For school year beginning July 1, 2017, students in the annexation area would attend City Schools of Decatur and taxpayers would pay Decatur School taxes in two installments in 2017 (usually due June 1st and December 20th).
So taxes would be paid to the school system for the school year where the children are enrolled.
I hope that clarifies things a bit.