By MATT PIKE
St. Joseph Post
A tax levy that has been in the works for some time for the Savannah School District received voter approval in Tuesday's election.
After losses on three previous tax levy's, the school district's 15 cent maintenance only tax levy won 1,175 to 1,032.
Savannah School District spokesperson Jess Gillett says she was excited to see the levy finally receive voter approval.
"The levy had been paired down several times over the course of the years and trying to get it to pass and so 15 cents is really, really the bare minimum of what we needed to address some critical, critical maintenance stuff," Gillett tells KFEQ/St. Joseph Post. "So, we are so, so, so excited that that passed, we will be unfortunately not seeing any profits from that until December."
She says though that's just fine because the district knows the money will at least be there.
But what was the difference between this year and the last three elections?
Gillett says she thinks the biggest change was how many voters went to the polls.
"Them being vocal about what they want and you know people really seeing the need, seeing the need in our buildings," Gillett explains.
Gillett says some funds received during the COVID pandemic got the ball rolling on some projects, and says now with these funds the district needs to figure out how to prioritize the needs.
"The board has a work session on April 18th, and they'll really start having some of those conversations as far as what's our next move, really prioritizing the three projects the Superintendent talked about the roofing, the HVAC, and the underground pipelines at the high school, those are big projects," Gillett says.
Gillett adds there are other critical needs behind those three big projects such as parking lots at the Savannah schools needing repairs.