We should know by next week what will happen to money from the sale of Hamilton County school property.
That's when Commissioners are scheduled to vote on an interlocal agreement.
The school board already approved it.
Both groups hashed out the details this morning.
If approved money from the sale of school property would go into an account to be used for capital improvements and maintenance.
School board member Mike Evatt says it formalizes the general practice for the past several years.
Mike Evatt, Hamilton County School Board, "It's one time money. The board doesn't get one time money to use on capital improvements and things like that very often, so when we do we're going to stretch that dollar as far as we can."
The agreement also adds the county to the title of any future school properties.
School Board Attorney Scott Bennett warned of liability insurance concerns.
Bennett says, "Quite literally just by putting your name on the title to a piece of property you have increased the potential exposure of Hamilton County taxpayers by $700,000."
Still at least two commissioners appear ready to take that risk.
Fred Skillern's worried that the county could end up not having enough property to back its triple a bond rating, which saves tax payer money.
Fred Skillern, "We give away a lot of our assets from the school system in the past 34 years 36 years I'm very familiar with, we've sold very few pieces of property that we abandon a school."
And commissioner Joe Graham wants to put the money in an escrow account to pay off debt from new schools....instead of, in his words, "going on a spending spree."
Joe Graham, Hamilton County Commissioner, "That's the tax payers money that we're deferring into another account just so we can spend it, so it's like 'hey, we're going to build a $30 million new school and we're going to get a bonus for building it so we can go out here and spend the money however we want to."
Commissioner Tim Boyd proposed revamping the education committee... adding school board members to the group.
He hopes the move would improve communication between the two bodies.
