Jackson School District proposes tax levy increase for teachers and staff

Jackson School District officials invited the public for a "Coffee and Conversations" with superintendent Scott Smith on Thursday, March 7. The topic of this meeting was to give educational information on Proposition T, the district's latest property tax proposal.

Smith started the meeting with a slideshow about Proposition T, which will be voted on during the Tuesday, April 2, election. Prop T is asking for a $0.47 tax levy increase to provide funds committed to teachers and staff as well as funds committed to "students' success". The raise would amount to a bit more than $7 per month for every $100,000 in appraised property, Smith explained.

Smith said the additional funds will help with "attracting and retaining quality teachers and staff and protecting programs and class sizes."

"It is for the classroom teachers, it's for the bus drivers, it's for the cooks. Everybody that works in the district. That's where it is committed and student success," he said.

A comment from the audience involved holding teachers accountable in the classroom.

"You want us to pass this to pay for everybody to get a raise when we have teachers that are allowing students to fail a quiz or a test only to retake it, instead of holding the teacher accountable and putting a zero in the grade book," an audience member said.

Smith said this is called "grading practice". He said a goal is to expose the repercussions of decisions students make. He contended they are holding students more accountable than before by telling them they have to redo the assignment and will have to learn the material and will not be able to avoid the assignment.

Another question asked was about the property tax that comes in and how much of that is commercial versus residential.

Smith said the businesses are taxed at a rate of 32%, compared to 19% for real estate for homes and 12% for agricultural lands.

Matt Lacey, the district's chief financial officer, added that Jackson does not have much commercial property compared to other cities in the region, such as Cape Girardeau, Poplar Bluff, or Sikeston, which have more property taxed at a higher level.

The officials also noted Jackson has the lowest Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Funds or ESSER, federal funds received by area districts for COVID-19 recovery. They said Poplar Bluff received $24,403,650, followed by Sikeston with $16,623,603 and Cape Girardeau with $15,197,349. Jackson received $7,216,046 federal dollars for ESSER.

If the tax levy is voted on and approved, Jackson school district will go from the second-lowest tax rate in Cape Girardeau County at 3.7998% to be between Sikeston and Cape Girardeau in the 4.1% to 4.2% range.

Another question was about the academic programs and opportunities Jackson offers to further the experience for students. Smith said the district does not cap the number of students who attend the Career and Technology Center on the campus of Cape Girardeau High School as most districts do but rather encourages students to attend. He said last year about 140 students from Jackson attended, and this year 176 are attending the career center.

Smith said the vote will be during spring break, and those who will be traveling can vote absentee vote starting Tuesday, March 19. Registered voters may cast an absentee ballot in person beginning the second Tuesday before the election.

"This is honestly something we know we still need. The need is still there, probably greater than last year. So after last year, we took the time to listen to our community. We did surveys, had forums and tried to get as much input from the community as we could. The one thing that kept coming back was the community said we would support faculty and staff. They don't want to build anything, but they want to make sure we have the good people in place, and that is what Prop T does." Smith said.