School Board will take up staff raises after tax passage

The St. Mary Parish School Board is preparing to put plans for new tax revenue into action while it gets ready to ask voters to renew another tax.
The board will meet at 5 p.m. Thursday at the Central Office Complex in Centerville.
The agenda for Thursday’s meeting includes adjustment of the district’s pay schedule to reflect the results of the March 20 election, when St. Mary voters approved a new 0.45% sales tax for staff pay.
Voters approved the new tax by a 62%-38% vote in a low turnout.
The tax is expected to raise about $3.9 million a year.
Thursday’s agenda says the board will consider changing the salary schedule to raise the pay for certified employees, mostly teachers, by $3,000 a year and for noncertified employees by $1,500 a year.
Those were raises board members said during the campaign that they wanted to enact. They said the raises were necessary to keep the district competitive in recruitment and retention of talented employees.
Opponents said the tax would impose a burden on St. Mary’s already-struggling economy.
The sales tax goes into effect in July.
Also Thursday, the board will consider a resolution calling for an Oct. 9 election on renewal of an 11.82-mill property tax.
The State Bond Commission’s approval is required before the measure goes on the ballot.
The board will also consider setting overall property tax rates for 2021 and has set aside time for public comment.
A mill is 1/10th-cent of tax applied to each dollar of a property’s assessed valuation. By law, residential property is assessed at 10% of market value. Louisiana’s homestead exemption protects the first $75,000 of a primary home’s market value from property taxes.
The board will also:
—Consider a request from the St. Mary Community Action Agency to operate the summer feeding programs at the St. Mary Alternative Program site, Raintree Elementary, School, Hattie Watts Elementary School and Maitland Elementary School.
—Consider job descriptions for the school psychologist and three new positions: K-2 literacy coach, K-2 literacy paraprofessional and social-emotional learning coach.
—Recognize Students of the Month Shelby Taylor of Berwick Elementary and Whitley Berry of M.E. Norman Elementary, and Employees of the Month Andrea Crappell of Berwick Elementary and Ocean Armond of Norman Elementary.
—Recognize this year’s Red Ribbon slogan and poster contest winners.

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