School Board Holds Third HB 581 Meeting

By LYDIA BERGLAR
News Editor

At 5 p.m. on Jan. 23, the Dade County Board of Education held the third and final hearing required to opt out of HB 581’s new property tax exemption.

Because the lost revenue amount that Leisa Cagle (citizen) presented at the second hearing differed from the board’s original number, Josh Ingle (superintendent) explained the process behind how the board arrived at their original number.

He said, “We received this spreadsheet from Georgia School Boards Association (GSBA) and Georgia School Superintendents Association (GSSA). The instructions said to send it to your tax assessor and have them fill out the information in yellow, and then the school district can input the millage rate, and all the other numbers will automatically populate because the spreadsheet was formulated. That’s exactly what we did.”

After Cagle’s presentation, Ingle asked Loran Grasham (business services director) to remove all commercial properties from the calculation. This yielded a net loss from 2018-2024 of $2,643,722.14 and $645,927.88 in 2024 alone—lower than the board’s previous $793,387.45 number, but higher than Cagle’s $382,000 number.

Ingle noted again that this doesn’t take into account the existing exemptions because the tax office’s vendor can’t separate each exemption into separate buckets. Therefore, the actual loss would be below this number.

When Cagle worked with Paula Duvall (chief tax assessor), they additionally took out commercial, industrial, forest land, and utilities and attempted to take rentals and agriculture properties into account.

Of the board’s new calculation Ingle said, “The loss wasn’t as significant, but at the end of the day, it’s still a loss.”

Johnny Warren (Trenton representative) said, “I am nervous about the numbers. We don’t truly know what we’re dealing with.”

Ingle gave an update on the number of school districts in Northwest Georgia Regional Education Service Agency (RESA) that intend to opt out. Only two aren’t opting out, even though most of these districts don’t have an existing local exemption.

Jayne Griffin (At-Large representative) said, “Where I’m coming from is, we’re charged to take care of our schools…At the same time, we want to be fair to taxpayers…[Opting out] is not going to cost taxpayers any more than what’s already happening. We already have something in place for them.”

Warren noted that when property is sold and comes onto the digest at the current fair market value, it has negative consequences on the school board’s revenue. Ingle added, “What it does is it increases the value of your digest.” Because this makes Dade look wealthier, it makes the chances of receiving equalization funding less likely.

Later, during Public Input, the Sentinel clarified that this is true regardless of whether HB 581 is in place or not. Ingle confirmed this, but explained that with HB 581, anyone not selling but switching from the current homestead exemption to the new state-wide exemption will cause the same effect—the digest increases, which means the chance of receiving equalization funding decreases.

Steve Forester (Lookout Mountain representative), like Warren, dislikes the unknowns behind the numbers. He also noted that the ballot “asks two divergent questions but only solicited one answer.” The question on the ballot asked if voters want a state-wide homestead exemption but also if they want governing bodies to be able to opt out.

The ballot read, “Shall the Constitution of Georgia be amended so as to authorize the General Assembly to provide by general law for a state-wide homestead exemption that serves to limit increases in the assessed value of homesteads, but which any county, consolidated government, municipality, or local school system may opt out of upon the completion of certain procedures?”

Forester also dislikes the lack of congruity between school board options and city/county options.

He then noted that in the 2022-2023 school year, Dade had 2,063 students, and 2,061 voters voted against the ballot measure. Making an analogy, he said, “This is not a valid conclusion to draw, but I drew it anyway…Each no vote represents one student…That 2,063 is the number that makes this an easier decision for me.”

Ingle noted that legislators are working on another bill to extend the opt-out deadline to May 1, but this may or may not pass.

Vince Lennon, reporter from “The Mountain Valley Independent,” asked if any conversations have happened between the school board and the county and city about each entity’s decision. Ingle said nothing formal has taken place, but he has communicated with Don Townsend (county executive) and the tax assessor’s office about the school board’s plans to opt out.

Lennon asked if Ingle sensed any apprehension from the county about the board’s decision. Citing the attendance of Bob Woods (District Three commissioner) and Dr. William Pullen (District One commissioner) at the last meeting, Ingle said no.

Lennon asked if Ingle knows why the two counties in our RESA who are opting in made that decision. Ingle didn’t know but noted that the counties opting in are Catoosa and Walker.