The Charleston County School Board decided Monday night to scale back its request to voters and ask them to approve a six-year, one-penny sales tax increase to pay for construction projects.
Board members had planned to put an eight-year sales tax increase on voters’ ballots in November, but a lack of business community support and revised revenue figures led them to reduce it by two years. The six-year tax would generate an estimated $75 million per year for a total of $450 million.
The money would go toward building 14 new schools, renovating four schools, acquiring land in three developments, conducting seismic evaluations of six buildings, creating design plans for one school and improving existing schools’ athletic facilities.
Actually, I’m surprised that anyone would want to pay for improvements. Government is a bad thing, and in the end, people should not pay for it.