“Everyone Gets Something”
BOBBY ARDOIN
St. Landry Now.com Editor
St. Landry Parish School Superintendent Milton Batiste says he plans to spread the wealth evenly throughout the District if voters approve a 9.9 mill increase proposal that will be placed before voters on a May 16 ballot.
Unlike a 2022 parishwide school millage proposition that failed considerably, Batiste indicated on Tuesday that if passed this time, the augmented millage will impact all employee groups and each school campus will be affected immediately.
Batiste, who has been busy campaigning and explaining the effects of the proposition to civic and public officials for nearly two months, provided projected millage effectiveness details and answered pertinent questions from members attending a noon meeting of the Opelousas Rotary club.
“One of the complaints heard when the last millage was presented was that some people felt there was nothing (in the millage) for them. They wanted to see something happen in their area,” Batiste said.
Batiste also noted that four years ago some school employees campaigned against the millage, since the millage showed that the projected employee increases would be distributed differently
“Now everyone gets something,” said Batiste.
Millage Details
If the millage is passed in 58 days, Batiste said all school workers will get a 10-year, $2,500 annual pay raise, while each school will receive student safety and security upgrades in addition to new tracks and turfed fields at six of the high schools which participate in athletics.
St. Landry Parish, Batiste said, is collecting 20.5 dedicated mills annually. That amount has not increased since 1986 and is nearly 19 mills less than the state average, said Batiste.
“Think about it. Where were you in 1986? I was in the second grade at Grolee Elementary. Student buses then cost $100,000 less now than they did 40 years ago and our insurance costs have gone up. We only had textbooks then, but now we provide software packages that cost millions of dollars and every student has a device,” Batiste pointed out.
“Everything since 1986 has changed except for the funding mechanism,” Batiste told the Rotarians.
Batiste said that presumably one reason the 2022 proposition failed was because the District asked voters to approve a larger 23 mills increase.
“Some people said that they thought that (in 2022) what the proposition was asking for was too much too fast. Even if this millage passes, (the District) still falls below the state average,” Batiste said.
Both Propositions Need To Pass
There will be two separate millage propositions placed on the ballot, but Batiste said both of them need to pass in order for the District to collect the total 9.9 mill increase.
One proposition asks for 7.7 mills over 10 years for the teachers’ raises. Another 2.2 mills is for 20 years of safety improvements that include resource officers, school counselors and nurses and athletic improvements.
Since each proposition has a different expiration date, there is a need to treat them differently, but voters need to approve both for each to become effective, Batiste said.
Voters Objections
Some opponents point to the Evangeline Downs Racino revenue which was originally sold to voters as a way to help fund St. Landry public education when it was passed in 2004.
Batiste said since the approval of that issue, the Racino portion of the educational funding is about $400,000 annually, an amount that goes to pay for vocational instruction.
Large land owners also have questions about the projected amounts they might have to pay on assessed property annually if there is a millage increase and parents who send their children to private or parochial schools are not proponents of the millage, said Batiste.
Others have said that the new track and Donald Gardner Stadium should act as a venue for track and turf-field football, but Batiste said the stadium is a city-owned facility that is now charging more than the previous $550 required for each school to hold an event there, said Batiste.
