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Following a similar decision made Wednesday by the Troup County Board of Commissioners, The Troup County School Board passed a millage rollback Thursday of 1.5 mills, which would ultimately lead to an approximately $4 million loss of projected revenue for the school system overall.

TCSS’s millage rate has stayed at 18.85 mills since 2005. The reduction of the mill brings the new rate to 17.35.

School Board Chairman Cathy Hunt said Superintendent Brian Shumate first suggested a one percent rollback to bring the millage rate to 17.85, but the calculations with this change showed the school system would see a potential $2.7 million decrease in projected revenue. Another suggestion posed pushing the rate back to 16.78 mills, which was the millage rate from 1995 to 1998, according to TCSS documents.

“We’re still collecting more move than we did last year, which should help with the increase in budget needs. We have inflation to worry about too,” Hunt said.  “I couldn’t get behind rolling it back [too far] when there’s no increase with funding because we need more money than we did last year.”

Expenses⁠ — from construction costs for the new Rosemont Elementary School to necessities like toilet paper and computers ⁠— have increased across the board for the school system, Hunt noted.

“We have a healthy reserve, which we want to stay healthy for rainy days. [The current housing climate] is a perfect storm with the housing market and property assessments skyrocketing,” Hunt said. “People need help and we’re sensitive to that. We’re going to try to make due, and if we have to dip into our reserve to keep in place what we have to, we will.”

Hunt said the board is not sure yet if the $4 million cut in revenue will lead to department funding cuts or project cost adjustments.