Morgan County Citizen: BOE to refund $1.7M to you

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THE MADISONIAN

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vol. 14, no. 51

serving morgan county since 1842

december 23, 2010

Inside

BOE to refund $1.7M to you

Today’s Edition

BOE to pay back excess sales tax collections in the form of property tax reduction

BY KATHRYN SCHILIRO MANAGING EDITOR The result of a misunderstanding between Board of Education (BOE) administration and the state Department of Revenue (DOR), first uncovered by the Morgan County Citizen, means county taxpayers will get a $1.771 million refund in the form of a property tax reduction next year.

According to the DOR, the Education Local Option Sales Tax II (ELOST II) collected $1.771 million over its cap of $8.277 million.

ELOST is a 1 percent sales tax that allows local school boards to collect funds for facilities, technology and transportation in a county.

ELOSTs can last for five years or until the cap is reached.

State law says that excess ELOST proceeds must be used to, first, pay

Mat Dogs place fifth in tournament,

despite injuries ... Page 1B

BOC chairman approaches hospital board

Holiday Hours The Citizen office will close at noon Thursday, and will be closed all day

BY PATRICK YOST EDITOR

Friday for the holiday.

Law Enforcement A man goes to retrieve another’s bag of cocaine, then can’t remember his “friend’s” name ... Page 8A

News & Features State legislators come to visit and talk next year’s budget numbers. It’s not looking good ... Page 2A

News & Features

Top: John and Karen Williams, Caleb’s grandparents, are comforted by Karen’s sister, Sandra Mallory.

PHOTO BY A. BELLEBUONO.

One Year Later Friends and family of Caleb Sorohan reflect

BY KATHRYN MCBROOM STAFF WRITER “Why?” It was the question on everyone’s lips in the days and months following Caleb Sorohan’s death. A year later his friends and family feel they might be a little closer to the answer.

On Wednesday, Dec. 16, 2009, Caleb was driving on Fairplay Road through Hard Labor Creek State Park in Rutledge when he collided head-on with a vehicle carrying a horse trailer.

In the six minutes leading up to the accident Caleb was texting a friend, and never looked up

See CALEB Page 10A

Santa wants you to be good

and

Citizen’s

read

the

Christmas

section ... Page 1C

Old jail may become community kitchen

BY PATRICK YOST EDITOR

News & Features A local boy makes the Empty Stocking Fund his mission ... Page 1D

See BOE Page 11A

Bohlen: Subsidy justifies questions

Sports Oconee

off school system debt; if there is no debt, the school system must use the funds "for the purpose of reducing its millage rate" in an amount equivalent to the excess proceeds.

According to Superintendent Dr. Stan DeJarnett, the school system has no debt – "We are a pay-asyou-go system," he said – which

A local group’s three-year effort to open and operate a community kitchen that would serve free meals inched a step closer to fruition Tuesday night.

My Friend’s House, a group of local organizers hoping to realize a selfstanding facility that would begin their outreach by serving three meals per week to needy Morgan County residents, received tacit approval from the Morgan County Board of Commissioners to explore the possibility of turning the shuttered Mor-

“ IT ’ S

AN ISSUE WE

CAN DEAL WITH AND GET PEOPLE OUT THERE IF WE CAN GET THE FACILITY. ” Patrick Alligood My Friend ’s House spokesperson

gan County Detention Center on U.S. 441 North into a community kitchen.

Patrick Alligood, serving as spokesperson for the group, said he and others conceived

See KITCHEN Page 11A

Holy Journey At Madison’s CenterPointe Church’s Living Nativity, church members portray Mary and Joseph’s journey into Bethlehem Sunday night.

The Living Nativity was a special project overseen by church members Chase and Karen Long and offered the story of Jesus’ birth with music and narration both Saturday and Sunday evenings. For complete coverage, see Page 6A. PHOTO BY A. BELLEBUONO.

Mack Bohlen wanted to make one thing perfectly clear Thursday night during the regular meeting of the Morgan Memorial Hospital Authority meeting.

So clear, in fact, that he prepared a statement.

The chairman of the Morgan County Board of Commissioners said recent rumors and criticisms of the commissioners regarding “micromanaging” the affairs of the hospital were without merit. What some call meddling, Bohlen basically said, he called stewardship. “…in our collective minds, with such a sizable public dollar commitment, strings are [and should be] attached. In fact, for us to spend taxpayer money in this way without some small measure of

See MMH Page 11A

MORGAN COUNTY CITIZEN

BOE

N EWS & F EATURES

from Page 1A

can only mean a millage rate reduction to the tune of $1.771 million for county taxpayers next fiscal year.

How did this happen?

ELOST III, which the county is currently collecting, was presented

by BOE administration as a "continuation" of ELOST II and was passed by county voters in a Sept.

2005 election. "There was not a stop/start between ELOST 2 [and] 3," BOE Director of Operations Bob Monk writes in a Dec. 7 e-mail to the Citizen. Monk is charged with keeping track of ELOST spending.

While ELOST III did mean continuing a 1 percent sales tax in the county, the DOR says there is no such thing as the "continuation" of an ELOST. "Each one of these [ELOSTs] stands alone; each one has a specific dollar amount," Vicki Lambert, director of the Local Government Services Division of the DOR, said. "As a legal entity, they are all separate."

Funds collected between the ELOST II cap of $8.277 million and the DOR's end date of March 31, 2006 – a total of $1.771 million – must be refunded to Morgan County taxpayers through a millage rate rollback, per state law, as the school system doesn't have any debt.

But that's not the guidance BOE administration was given in Sept.

2005, according to DeJarnett.

MMH

After making calls last week, DeJarnett was able to confirm with then-Superintendent Dr. Patricia Stokes as well as school system attorney Cory Kirby that the DOR, in a conversation with Stokes and Kirby in 2005, instructed county school administration to book ELOST collections as ELOST III when collections for the ELOST II amount were complete. This confirmed to administration that there was no specific stop date for ELOST II. A note written by BOE Financial Director Pam McWilliams in 2005 was found filed with a letter – dated Sept. 22, 2005 and addressed from Kirby to Phil Embry at the revenue deartment – informing the DOR of county voters' decision to approve ELOST III. McWilliams' note confirms the previously mentioned conversation and supports the perceived lack of an ELOST II stop date.

"The Department of Revenue said not only could we, but we should start booking any subsequent ELOST [II] distributions to ELOST III," DeJarnett said in an interview Friday. "As soon as we collected $8,277,000 for ELOST II, on the advice of Department of Revenue, any subsequent revenues were booked as ELOST III collections."

The school system continued collecting proceeds for the next five years, unaware of the ELOST II stop date and subsequent over-

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input on the goings-on here would make us poor stewards of the public’s trust and money.”

Bohlen was referring to the annual $880,000 per year contribution the county makes towards the operation of Morgan Memorial. The contribution, he said, equates to approximately one mill of the county’s 8.4 millage rate, which is a rate used to calculate property taxes.

The amount equals 12 percent of the county’s total operating budget, Bohlen said.

“With this said, if the hospital wished to ‘go it alone’ without our substantial subsidy, we would totally remove ourselves from any/all decision making. If not, expect us to continue to demand some measure of fiscal accountability for our contribution regardless of any/all unwarranted criticisms we

might receive from those illinformed regarding our perceived ‘micromanagement,’” he read from his statement.

Bohlen also made stern comments regarding the work of Morgan County Commissioner Ellen Warren, who serves as the commission’s liason to the hospital authority. “I don’t think she’s asked for any information that shouldn’t be made public,” he said. “She’s done a yeoman’s job bringing information back to the board of commissioners and I commend her for that.”

Despite the frank nature of Bohlen’s comments, the authority agreed and said it appreciated the county’s support. “I doubt there is any county in the state of Georgia whose county government has been as supportive as Morgan County,” said authority member Dr. Ken

KITCHEN the idea three years ago.

My Friend’s House was officially founded in January 2010 with the intent of “opening a community kitchen in the community.”

“All of us have a desire to help our community,” Alligood said. “It’s not just people who are unemployed anymore, it’s everybody.”

Alligood requested that the board consider leasing the old jail facility, and primarily its kitchen, to the group.

“I’m open-minded to it,” said Mack Bohlen, chairman, Morgan County Board of Commissioners.

Bohlen did stress to Alligood that the board would

from Page 1A

have to consider potential existing code violations at the facility before it could give full approval to the concept.

“The things indicated to me (at the old jail) would be fairly minor,” Alligood said.

My Friend’s House would become an extension of a current weekly prepared food distribution program in place at the Madison Presbyterian Church. According to Susan Ivey, board member of Free Lunch Friday at the church, the program on Tuesday distributed 152 meals to individuals in Morgan County. It also distributed a ham to each fam-

Connelly named to Dean’s List SPECIAL TO THE CITIZEN Cathy Cox, President of Young Harris College, is pleased to announce that Jacob Taylor Connelly has been named to the Young Harris College Dean’s List for the fall 2010 semester.

Students who achieve a 3.5

grade point average or better are eligible to be named to the Dean’s List.

Connelly, a junior at Young Harris College, is a graduate of Morgan County High School. He is the son of John and Janice Connelly of Madison, Ga.

collection of $1.771 million, until a dialogue about ELOST with the Citizen began earlier this month and the question of ELOST II over-collection was raised by the Citizen last week in an interview with Monk and DeJarnett.

The DOR maintains that ELOST II, approved by county voters in March 2002 and beginning July 2002, did have a specific stop date: March 31, 2006.

(ELOSTs can only start and stop at the beginning and end, respectively, of calendar quarters, a key piece of information BOE administration was unaware of.)

"That one (ELOST II), timewise, could've run through June 2007," Lambert said. "Looking at how much you collected, in the beginning of July 2005, we projected you would reach your money cap by March 2006 and, actually, you did."

According to the DOR, this established the ELOST II stop date as March 31, 2006.

Officially, revenue officials still haven't notified the school board of the excess ELOST II funds, according to DeJarnett, even though he's been in communication with the DOR about this for the past week. Further, the state Department of Audits, which examines the board's finances each year, hasn't cited the BOE for excess ELOST II collections.

At present, DeJarnett has requested that the DOR acknowledge that the guidance received in 2005 was incorrect, and provide an exact amount of excess ELOST II

Lewis. Bohlen told the board that currently Morgan County contributes more towards the operation of the hospital than any other likeminded government entity in the state, a fact not lost on authority member Jim Ferraro.

“It’s a lot of support; for a lot of support, they should get a lot of information,” Ferraro said. “This hospital can’t exist without the support of the county.”

“I know it’s been tough the last few years, but that’s nothing new,” said Dr. Lewis, who has served Morgan County for more than 50 years in the medical arena. “The hospital is still serving the public and still saving lives.”

On that point, Bohlen agreed. “I have a lot of friends who wouldn’t be here today without this hospital,” he said. “We expect to have information coming back because we put this money ily along with winter coats and toys.

Alligood anticipates that, if My Friend’s House began distribution at the former jail, it too would serve approximately 150 people three times a week with a hot, prepared meal.

“It’s certainly a very real issue,” he said. “It’s an issue we can deal with and get people out there if we can get the facility.”

December 23, 2010 Page 11A

proceeds. DeJarnett is also clearing the refund of these excess proceeds with the Department of Audits.

Revenue officials let DeJarnett know Tuesday that they wouldn't have an answer to his query until Monday.

So, how much of a reduction in property tax will this ELOST II refund generate?

A mill in Morgan County is presently worth about $825,0000.

The refund totals $1.771 million, which is the equivalent of more than 2 mills, according to DeJarnett. The BOE's current, FY11 millage rate is 13.743.

The county's tax digest is currently $907.8 million. If the tax digest decreases, a mill would be worth less money, which would mean this refund could knock even more off the top of the millage rate.

ELOST III Update ELOST III was approved by county voters in Sept. 2005 for $21,260,500. To date, about $17 million has been collected in ELOST III funds, but Monk expects that collections for the next four months of ELOST III will average about the same as last month: $260,000 to $280,000.

Last month saw the ELOST balance begin with more than $3 million and, after revenues of more than $261,000 and expenditures of almost $23,000, ended November with $3.3 million.

As of Sept. 2009, the biggest expenses funded by ELOST III in-

into this hospital.”

Bohlen also took the authority to task for what he said was a reluctance to release its annual audit. Bohlen said the county had received a letter from its auditing firm regarding the hospital’s annual audit and that the request had been denied.

Earlier in the meeting authority treasurer Ron Milton told the authority that the audit had been completed but that the finance committee wanted to wait until January to release the audit to

clude: more than $5.2 million on the high school gymnasium, more than $3 million on technology and more than $1.3 million on the Central Office building and furnishings. There haven't been any new projects since last year, according to DeJarnett, just "renovations, updates and improvements."

ELOST III has been projected by the DOR to end on March 31, 2011 "because we're not projecting you would hit the max," Lambert said.

ELOST IV to begin in April Where does that leave ELOST IV, approved by county voters more than a year ago and capped at a total of $29,575,000?

ELOST IV, contrary to the December start date publicized at the time of the referendum, will begin in April 2011. It has an expiration date, if the cap isn't reached, of March 31, 2016.

The school board has yet to set priorities for ELOST IV projects.

At more than $11 million in needed ELOST IV funds, the new elementary school in Rutledge is the costliest project on the agenda.

The final total on the new school will cost more than this projected amount in ELOST IV funding, but will also include revenues provided by the state and those rolled over from ELOST III. If the new school isn't built by March 2016, the board has committed to at least have set aside the needed funding to build the school.

the board so that it could clarify corrective statements made by the hospital’s auditing firm.

Bohlen said the county was mandated by law to deliver the county’s audit, including a copy of the hospital’s audit, to the Georgia State Auditor

by December 31. “I demand that this be turned over immediately,” he said.

Authority Chairman Terry Evans told Bohlen that he was unaware that the county was mandated by law to deliver the audit to the state. “I

thought the right thing to do was have the authority review this before it went into the county coffers. I was not aware there was a state law.”

Evans said the authority would comply with the request and would continue to work with the board regarding the operation and affairs of the hospital. “My belief is we’ve got to work as a team to make sure this facility provides the best medical care available. When we do that everything else will take care of itself.”