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South Side school tax increase carries state echoes with it

The South Williamsport Area School Board has given preliminary approval of a .65-mill real estate tax increase in its 2017-18 preliminary budget, which is above its Act 1 index of 0.5 mills.

But those are just numbers. The mixture of misgivings and frustration that came with the sizable tax increase – $65 for a home valued at $100,000 – was just as noteworthy.

Board members expressed misgivings that the increase will facilitate expenditures that won’t actually benefit the education of the district’s children. And they expressed frustration with the state Legislature for not solving any of the problems that show up in the district budget. The biggest expenditures in the budget are pensions and health care and the district has no control of those areas, it was pointed out.

“I would rather raise taxes for improving things in the school, adding to curriculums and investing in our infrastructure, but we’re not,” board member Joseph Pulizzi III commented.

Board President John Engel said the Legislature must come together and solve the public employee pension crisis.

Even with the tax increase, the district still is not covering its increased pension costs.

The district held the line on taxes last year, so it’s not as if it has not tried to control the hit on taxpayers.

But if the South Williamsport district is being impacted by the state’s lingering pension woes and health care – two issues that need to be solved at another level of public government – we can’t imagine it’s much different at other districts in the region.

We hope state lawmakers of all political stripes are listening. It’s time to solve these problems rather than letting politics keep real reform from happening.

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