A Penny for Education

Tomorrow, voters in Athens will find just one item on the ballot: the one-cent sales tax referendum for public schools.

The education—Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax has been in effect in Athens-Clarke County since 1997. If this issue is approved tomorrow, e-SPLOST 2012 will run from July 2012 through June 2017.

The pennies raised through the sale of automobiles, UGA sweatshirts and scoops of frozen yogurt, among other items, have helped renovate, rebuilt and redesign many of the city’s public school buildings into places that enhance learning, according to officials.

A large proportion of these pennies, advocates will tell you, comes from University of Georgia students, football fans who flock to home games and employees who live in neighboring counties but who work, eat and shop in Athens.

The 2012 eSPLOST is expected to raise $105 million, officials says. And how will this money be spent?

It will build two new elementary schools, one on the eastside, the other on the west side of the county. Maxine Easom will be constructed near the site the Old Gaines School Elementary. Easom will be filled by students now attending overcrowded Gaines, Barnett Shoals and Whit Davis elementary schools.

Westside Elementary will relieve the stuffed and elementary schools.

SPLOST 2012 will also fund the renovation and remodeling of , which architects say is the facility most in need of repair. Students assigned to Barrow will be housed in the old Gaines School while Barrow is under construction. and will also be basically rebuilt.

"A recent 2011 report by the 21st Century School Fund found that there are clear correlations between the quality of school facilities and student and teacher attendance, teacher retention and recruitment, child and teacher health, and the quality of curriculum," said Rachel Watkins, PTO volunteer at . "We have school buildings that leak when it rains and smell of mold. Our children deserve better."

and have been the beneficiaries of earlier e-SPLOST monies. Both schools have been practically rebuilt into modern, 21st-Century facilites, with portions of the older schools retained.

Chase Street School has been renovated and rebuilt, with the historic part of the building anchoring the new construction. Officials said at a recent meeting that at Barrow, they would be preserving the historic part while adding new classrooms. Sandwiched between UGA and Five Points, Barrow has the smallest campus of any school in the district.

Earlier e-SPLOSTS have funded the construction of the H.T. Edwards Complex. It includes the Office of Early Learning, Classic City High School, the Athens Community Career Acadey, Classic City High School and Boys and Girls Club.

"It's a great thing for all the children of Clarke County," Kim Ripps. "It's a penny and people have been have been paying it for a while. Whether you have children in the public school system or not, we all live in this community and their education is essential to the well being of our entire community."

Elections officials are expecting a low turnout for tomorrow's vote. So far, they said, 526 people have voted in the downtown office, and 42 people have sent in ballots.