Cook wins re-election to Florence School District 3 board

LAKE CITY — Richard Cook, chairman of the Florence County School District 3 Board of Trustees, has won re-election to his seat over challenger Barbara Bryant.

Cook won in Tuesday’s election with 98 votes to Bryant’s 27. He holds Seat 7B and has served on the board since 1994.

In addition, two incumbents and one new school board candidate were declared winners in Tuesday’s election because they faced no opposition.

Bernard McIntosh and Paula Morris will continue to hold Seats 4B and 6, respectively. McIntosh, the board’s vice chairman, has served on the board of trustees since 1997, and Morris has served since 2003.

Martin Jackson was the only candidate for Seat 2, the Coward district. He will complete the year remaining on the unexpired term of Debbie Matthews, who resigned because of health issues facing her family members, district Superintendent Beth Wright said earlier this year.

The results were announced at the district’s annual citizens’ meeting, held at the Lake City High School gymnasium on Tuesday. About 30 people attended the meeting, where they voted on the district’s 2009-10 budget.

The budget passed by a 28-0 vote, Wright said. The board had approved the prior two readings of the budget before it went to the citizens for approval.
In her remarks, the superintendent said the district is financially sound and is “doing more with less” in light of $1.5 million in cuts.

The 2009-10 proposed budget is $22,208,938, and it is balanced, said Donna D. Sullivan, the district’s senior finance director.

The budget is built on a base student cost of $1,908, which is lower than those proposed by the state House and Senate, and the projected enrollment for the upcoming school year is 3,585 students, according to information Wright presented at a previous workshop.

The district’s general fund balance will be $1,284,760, and the local building fund balance will be $4,947,967.

To balance the budget, the district has requested a transfer of $1,561,840 from the local building fund balance, the highest request in the past five years, Sullivan said. The district usually makes such a request, but typically doesn’t have to actually transfer the money, she said.

The estimated actual transfer is $1,454,234, she said.

The budget calls for no tax millage increase beyond what’s authorized by law for inflation and growth, Sullivan said.

In addition, the budgetary information states the district will cut 20 certified classroom positions and that five classified positions have been eliminated from the general fund.

An additional 11 classified positions will be eliminated because of a decrease in the state’s technical assistance money to the district in 2009-10, the budget states.

The 2009-10 plan also includes two furlough days built into the proposed budget to save an estimated $175,000.