Search for solutions

Shelby County Commissioner Michael Whaley said several solutions have been discussed, the simplest being prodding Shelby County Schools to complete projects in a timely manner.

“We have really tried to push SCS on encumbering those funds quicker,” he said. “(Municipal districts) should see much faster and larger reimbursements going forward.”

Whaley said the issue was getting more discussion and attention at the county level and that he was interested in pursuing more robust solutions to help suburban school districts get their capital improvement funds on time.

Meanwhile, Cathey said the school district often has to find other ways to pay for capital projects, like dipping into reserves. However, when the funding does come through from the county, it has to be put directly into another project. School districts are legally barred from using it to replenish their general funds, even if money was taken from the general fund to pay for capital improvements.

“The challenge we have with how we use this funding, is they’re very strict,” he said. “It has to be used for capital improvement.”

Other districts have also found different ways to pay for capital projects. Much of the funding for Collierville’s new $90 million high school came from a bond sale. The city’s taxpayers will pay back the debt through sales tax and a property tax increase approved by the town board of mayor and aldermen several years ago.

Collierville Schools outgoing superintendent John Aitken declined to discuss capital projects funding. Representatives of Bartlett City Schools and Arlington Community Schools did not respond to requests for comment.

Unreliable funding

Lakeland School System Superintendent Ted Horrell said the suburban school districts have had productive discussions with the county about the issue and he was optimistic about the talks, but his school district is still owed about $1.3 million from the last two fiscal years. He said he has never relied on the funding — due to its unpredictable nature — and hasn’t counted on it while drafting district budgets.

Horrell said that while Lakeland Schools hasn’t been unable to address major capital projects, the district misses out on the ability to save money on projects by addressing multiple issues at once with the same contractor. Instead, what could be one large project has to be broken down into smaller pieces, done over multiple fiscal years. Each one of those projects has to be put out to bid separately, taking more time and potentially incurring more cost.

Millington Municipal Schools public relations supervisor Stacy Ross said in an email that the district was owed about $2.2 million from the past two fiscal years.

And a county clawback provision related to SCS reducing spending means they will never see about $40,000 of that total.

“As these funds are vital to the success of our capital and financial planning, we have respectfully requested a commitment of payment of the allocated funds to Millington Municipal Schools by (fiscal year) 2019 year end,” she said. “However, we have been unsuccessful at obtaining this commitment from Shelby County Government.”

Whaley, who has a background in education and chairs the county commission committee on education, said the county could explore giving capital improvements funding in two parts to help avoid the clawback scenario Millington schools are facing — which happens when SCS doesn’t spend all the money that has been allocated.

He said he is also interested in pursuing wholesale changes to the funding system that would allow the commission to invest in specific projects in school districts based on what the most pressing needs are, with some guidance from attendance figures to keep funding equitable between districts. But making a change that large would require approval from Nashville.

For now, prompting SCS to use the money it has been allocated remains the most straightforward option.

“We want those projects to be done quicker so that kids can benefit from them,” Whaley said.

Corinne Kennedy is a reporter for The Commercial Appeal. She can be reached via email at Corinne.kennedy@ Commercialappeal.com or on Twitter @Corinneskennedy.