Annual Sales Tax Holiday Happening July 26 – July 28

July 12, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

Save the date and save! The State of Tennessee’s annual sales tax holiday weekend will take place Friday, July 26 through Sunday, July 28.

https://www.tn.gov/revenue/taxes/sales-and-use-tax/sales-tax-holiday/sth-traditional.html

During this holiday, Tennesseans can save nearly 10 percent on qualifying clothing, school supplies, and computers. Tennesseans can purchase clothing and school supplies tax-free if they are priced at $100 or less and buy computers tax-free if they are priced at $1500 or less. Qualifying items may be purchased online and in stores.

“Tennessee’s commitment to strong fiscal stewardship has allowed our state to cut taxes and put dollars back in the pockets of hardworking Tennesseans,” said Gov. Bill Lee. “I encourage every Tennessee family to take advantage of back-to-school savings and thank the General Assembly for partnering to provide direct financial relief for taxpayers.”

“With the start of the school year around the corner, we encourage Tennessee families to take advantage of these savings,” Revenue Commissioner David Gerregano said. “This is the only sales tax holiday this year.”
For more information about the sales tax holiday, including a list of qualifying items, visit www.tntaxholiday.com. You can also call 615-253-0600 or email revenue.support@tn.gov with questions.

The Department of Revenue is responsible for the administration of state tax laws and motor vehicle title and registration laws and the collection of taxes and fees associated with those laws.

The Department collects about 87 percent of total state revenue. During the 2023 fiscal year, it collected nearly $22 billion in state taxes and fees and more than $4.7 billion in taxes and fees for local governments. To learn more about the Department, visit www.tn.gov/revenue.

July 12, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

A year after being named assistant principal at DeKalb Middle School, Teresa Jones is moving up.

During Thursday night’s regular monthly meeting, Director of Schools Patrick Cripps included on his monthly personnel report to the Board of Education that Jones is the new principal at DeKalb Middle School succeeding Caleb Shehane who has resigned.

Jones has just finished up her first year as assistant principal. Before that she served 20 years as a seventh-grade science teacher at DeKalb Middle School.

Teresa started her teaching career in 2002 after graduating with a bachelor’s degree from Tennessee Tech. During the pandemic in 2020, Jones decided to obtain a master’s degree in Instructional Leadership. Teresa was also chosen as Teacher of the Year for DMS and at the district level in 2020.

Meanwhile, those employed by Director Cripps since the last Board of Education meeting are as follows:

Jessica Leiser, Bookkeeper at DeKalb West School.

Hannah Bratten, Music Teacher, DeKalb Middle & DeKalb West School

Sydney Simmonds, Kindergarten teacher at Smithville Elementary School

Andrew Christian, teacher at Smithville Elementary School

Stephanie Majors, teacher at Smithville Elementary School

Brian Smith, teacher at Smithville Elementary School

Terri Kilgore, Special Education Secretary

Elizabeth James, teacher at Smithville Elementary School

Brandi O’Conner. Educational Assistant at Smithville Elementary School

Hannah Culwell, teacher at Northside Elementary School

Jennifer Sykes, teacher at DeKalb Middle School

Leave of Absence

Crystal Barnes, leave as requested

Transferred

Teresa Jones, from Assistant Principal to Principal at DeKalb Middle School

Max Patterson, Band Director

Shelia McMillen, from Special Education Secretary to teacher at DeKalb West School

Taylor Chapman, from Educational Assistant to teacher at Northside Elementary School

Brandi Womack, Bookkeeper to Educational Assistant

Resignation/Retirement

Brooklyn Shirah, gifted teacher, resigned, County-Wide

Tiffany Bjorge, Educational Assistant, resigned at Northside Elementary School

Ryan Childers, resigned, Maintenance County-Wide

Sarah Storey, teacher, resigned at Northside Elementary School

Kayla Randolph. Educational Assistant, resigned at DeKalb West School

Victoria Stanley, teacher, resigned at Smithville Elementary School

Emily Harville, teacher, resigned at Smithville Elementary School

Caleb Shehane, Principal, resigned at DeKalb Middle School.

Meanwhile, DCHS educator Barbara Weller was granted tenure by the board during Thursday night’s meeting.

In other business, the Board voted to change the monthly meeting times from 7 p.m. to 6 p.m. and the workshops from 6 p.m. to 5 p.m. on the second Thursday night of each month starting in August at the Ernest Ray Education Center.

July 12, 2024
By: Dwayne Page

Should DeKalb County borrow up to $65 million through the issuance of general obligation bonds for the development and construction of a judicial center/jail?

The voters of DeKalb County may get to answer that question at the ballot box in the November election but even so they won’t be able to force a repeal of the 51-cent property tax increase for debt service levied by the county commission with passage of the 2024-25 budget last month.

With less than a week until the deadline for turning in signatures, organizers and volunteers of a petition drive Thursday afternoon turned over to County Clerk James L. (Jimmy) Poss, as required by law, names of 2,471 presumptive registered voters who have signed that they want a public referendum on the bond issue. Aside from those submitted Thursday, Poss said another petition had already been turned in to him a few days ago with eight names and others are possibly still being circulated in the community. Poss said he will accept other petitions that may come in prior to next week’s deadline before he is required to turn them all over to the election commission, which has a limited time frame for checking and verifying the signatures.

Petitioners are concerned, upset, and in some cases downright angry with the county commission and county mayor for saddling them with a 51 cent tax hike, only a year after imposing a 27 cent increase, and for taking action to borrow money to build either a new 190 bed jail or more likely a judicial center that many don’t want or believe is needed.

As part of the bond resolution, the public was given 20 days to file a protest from the date of publication of the notice in the newspaper which was Wednesday, June 26.

“The public has 20 days from the date of publication to file with the county clerk a petition signed by at least 10% of the registered voters of the county (1,361) protesting the issuance of the bonds”, the public notice stated.

Although the signatures still have to be verified the petition effort with already at least 2,471 names appears to have more than exceeded the 10% threshold in order for the protest to proceed to a referendum.

The petition drive was launched last month only a couple of days after the county commission approved an initial and detailed resolution authorizing the issuance of general obligation bonds not to exceed $65 million for the development and construction of a judicial center/jail as well as the 51-cent property tax increase for debt service to fund it. In each case, the commission was deadlocked on the vote at 7 to 7 but County Mayor Matt Adcock, as Chairman of the Commission, cast the tie breaker in favor of passage.

Jon Slager, a DeKalb County native and Lascassas resident and attorney, assisted in organizing the petition drive and in a prepared statement Thursday said he is pleased with the overwhelming public response.

“On behalf of the people that asked me to assist with this, thank you to everyone who worked so hard supporting this petition. The response by the people of this county has been overwhelming. Because of the hard work of so many, nearly double the number of signatures required have been obtained, and the deadline is still several days away. Ultimately, the DeKalb County Court Clerk will send all the petitions to the election commission next week and that is who will do an official count,” said Slager

“The people I got to speak with over the last few weeks had a genuine concern about the real costs of a sixty-five-million-dollar criminal justice center. Even at an interest rate of just four percent, that sixty-five million dollars would balloon to over one hundred and ten million dollars. Then where does the money come from for the additional costs of nearly doubling the corrections staff? Are the taxpayers also being asked to pay over three-hundred thousand dollars to Steve Bates (county’s fiscal agent) for issuing these bonds? What about the threat of imminent domain and taking someone’s property? The true costs of this project are staggering and will undoubtedly leave other necessary projects unfunded for decades without additional future tax increases,” added Slager.

“When is it ever wrong for the public to have a voice in government decisions,” said Dennis Stanley, one of the volunteers in the petition drive.

“I saw the people’s voice in action. The days I helped with the drive the people who signed the petition were of various ages and socio-economic backgrounds. As expected, comments varied on what to do with local tax revenues from building a new school to better roads, but a criminal justice center did not appear to be high on their priority list”.

“In short, the people were obviously not happy with recent actions of the county commission as evidenced by the number of signatures on the petition, he added.

County Commissioner Beth Pafford, another volunteer in the petition drive, downplayed her role saying only she wanted the public to be aware of it.

“My involvement in this was minimal but I felt I had to let the people know that they can do something about this,” said Commissioner Pafford. “I feel strongly we have other options that we have not explored thoroughly enough and this plan with this much money for 30 years is what people have a problem with. If all of these petitions are cleared, people can vote to decide whether they want the county to move forward with taking out the $65 million bond that would be paid off over 30 years to support a new jail and justice center,” she said.

The action by the county commission and mayor to move forward last month came after months of discussion and planning to address long standing deficiencies at the jail and annex as defined by the Tennessee Corrections Institute in order to maintain state certification.

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