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ERROR: type should be string, got "https://www.theintelligencer.com/news/article/Facility-tax-has-District-7-support-12442297.php\nFacility tax has District 7 support\nJulia Biggs • jbiggs.edwi@gmail.com\nPublished 2:55 pm CST, Tuesday, December 19, 2017\nThe Edwardsville District 7 Board of Education voted Monday night to join other Madison County school boards to put a county-wide 1% School Facilities Sales Tax on the March ballot. The retail sales tax, which narrowly was defeated last April, is projected to generate over $4 million annually for District 7 but can only be used for school facilities.\nThis will be the third time the 1% School Facilities Sales Tax has been presented to voters. The idea was first presented on the 2011 ballot but was overwhelmingly defeated. Then again last April the sales tax was placed on the ballot, but it narrowly loss by less than 300 votes.\nThe District 7 board took a neutral stance last April on the sales tax issue because the passing of Prop E was the district’s top priority. “We determined as a group that we felt our best interest would be served by passage of Prop E,” Edwardsville District 7 Superintendent Lynda Andre said. “That was our single most important concern at the time – was the Ed Fund - and we did not want to mix the two during that campaign in an effort that it might split the vote or cause us not to receive the Education Fund tax increase that we desperately needed. So at that time we stayed neutral….”\nThe proposed 1% School Facilities Sales Tax would place an additional 1% tax on general merchandise sold at stores including clothing, furniture, appliances, gas and food at restaurants. Services, anything that is not tangible such as labor or repairs, are not taxable. This includes things such as dry cleaning, cleaning services as well as nail and hair salon services.\nDistrict 7 has been given estimates that the sales tax would generate approximately $4.5 million per year which the district could then use for its facilities. Dave Courtney, Assistant Superintendent of Business Operations, explained during the finance meeting Monday evening, that the funds could be used for “any acquisition, construction….to existing facilities or if we want to add a new facility….funds from the tax can pay for that,” he said. “It can be used to address the health life safety projects or the issues that the district has, which we discussed at the facilities committee in November, which is about $12 million in outstanding projects right now that are being finalized as we speak with the state board for health life safety based on our 10 year health life safety survey,” Courtney said.\n“So the sales tax revenue from the county school facilities sales tax could be used to assist with those projects,” Courtney added. “If the tax were not in place, the board would have to issue bonds that could potentially increase the tax rate to address the maintenance issues that we have in the buildings through our life safety survey.”\nCourtney pointed out that the district’s $12 million in outstanding projects are maintenance items that had been deferred over the last several years because funds simply weren’t available. The items, which Courtney noted would be brought to the full board early next year, includes maintenance projects such as roof and parking lot repairs and maintenance as well as replacement of Lincoln Middle School’s old HVAC system.\nFunds generated from the 1% sales tax could also be used for debt service retirement on bonds that are school facility bonds. “Not working cash bonds or any bond not related to a school facility,” Courtney noted. “So it could also be used for future debt service retirement.”\nTerri Dalla Riva, a school board member, stressed that the sales tax doesn’t tax unprepared food. “So there’s a lot of grocery items that it does not tax. It does not tax medications so that actually provides some relief to the consumer,” she said. “Moreover, we have a big farming community and so farm and parts are not taxed, and it will even help alleviate property taxes...so that’s good.”\nSchool Board Member William Catalano pointed out that he looked at the sales tax as a way to support other school districts in Madison County to provide better education through providing resources for adequate facilities. “The other thing is the diversification of different revenue sources,” he added. “I think we see when our channels of revenue come from primarily a few resources and those get interrupted how it limits our ability to provide the best education possible.”\nAndre also shared that the majority of Madison County School Boards had already voted or were voting that night to support putting the sales tax on the ballot, and that only the Collinsville board voted against supporting it.\nThe board also discussed how this sales tax could be viewed as a more “consumption based tax” that is spread out across a much larger base of people who don’t necessarily live in Madison County.\nI think ideally I look at it is that we pass that facilities sales tax, we undertake the repairs as required for the health life safety survey, we establish a safety net for the event that we do have some kind of major catastrophe and then go ahead and start looking at debt service retirement – paying off some of our facilities (debt),” Dalla Riva said. “So when we look at all of those things combined, we say this is a wonderful opportunity, for not just our District 7 communities but for communities throughout Madison county.”\nIn other board action, the board approved the 2017 estimated tax levy, which is for the 2018-19 school year. The levy rate will not exceed $4.72, an amount that is less than Prop E’s projected $4.77.\nThe board also unanimously approved extension of Andre’s contract. Her contract was extended one year through June 30 of 2019."