On March 20, voters throughout Morgan County gathered at their local voting stations to nominate political officials and to vote “yes” or “no” on a one-cent, county-wide sales tax to renovate and construct schools in the Jacksonville, Triopia, Waverly, and Meredosia-Chambersburg school districts.
However, voters rejected the one-cent hike 63 percent to 37 percent. The sales tax increase was targeted directly for the construction of schools and for the purpose of aiding other schools throughout the district, not for administration salaries or operating expenses.
The one-cent sales tax was approved unanimously by the school board, however beliefs throughout Morgan County varied. Skeptics believed it was simply the wrong time for an added tax since our community has been suffering great economic difficulties. Many citizens also believed that placing a tax for the unemployed and elderly was unfair.
The tax would have generated $2.1 million a year for District 117, and aimed to fund the district’s vision of building a new high school, close Franklin and North Elementary Schools and update, renovate, and even construct new schools within Morgan County.
Since my kindergarten days, I have been a student in the district’s schools. Before attending JHS, I had always known every school I had been at as outdated and filthy, especially Turner Junior High School.
With its undersized gymnasium, lack of wheelchair accessibility, and terrifying dust bunnies closing Turner was the school board’s first priority. However throughout the district, there are other schools suffering just as poorly as Turner.
Elementary schools such as Washington and Franklin, which are more than half a century old, have been crumbling for years. From daily mechanical issues to students’ learning in a basement, schools like these have been suffering for years.
People have pointed fingers for the failure of the sales tax being passed on false information given out by the voters who said “no”. Others blamed it on the school board’s lack of information given to the community.
But the sad truth is that there are simply not enough people living throughout the county that care about their community’s well-being in the future.
A one-cent tax increase was absolutely worth the sacrifice to help a dwindling community rebuild and create a stable future for the area’s schools. With the school board recently announcing the district’s lack of money and expected staff cuts, we can only expect the District 117 schools and other area schools to suffer even more.