Two school board members help launch anti-SPLOST website before referendum authorized

The week before the Muscogee County School Board votes on whether to authorize a tax referendum, a website campaigning against the proposal already is online.

And two of the board's nine members helped launch it.

District 2 representative John Thomas and District 8 representative Frank Myers declined to disclose who posted NoSchoolBoardTax.com, but they admitted they have contributed to the social media effort combating superintendent David Lewis' request to renew the Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax that expired Dec. 31.

"We're giving input," Myers said, "and we're behind it 100 percent."

"I think it expresses my views on the SPLOST," Thomas said. "There's a group of people involved in supporting the anti-SPLOST movement, and I think some of them would prefer to remain anonymous."

Nathan Smith, a financing company manager who campaigned for Myers and Thomas last year, confirmed he is among that group. Smith acknowledged he administers the Facebook page linked to NoSchoolBoardtax.com, which had 223 likes as of Wednesday afternoon, two days after it was created.

"We're not raising money yet," Smith said, " but I am interested in doing a formal effort, buying the yard signs and things of that nature if there's a referendum."

The board will decide during Tuesday's 6 p.m. meeting whether to approve Lewis' request to authorize a March 17 special election on the 1 percent sales tax. The preliminary list of proposed projects, which Lewis presented last month, totals $192,185,000, ranging from $56 million for replacing Spencer High School to $250,000 for upgrading playgrounds. If the board authorizes the referendum, the list won't be finalized until input is gathered from residents through 10 public forums, one in each of the district's nine zones, plus a centralized one, Lewis has said.

Myers and Thomas, however, contend the superintendent hasn't given them the proper chance for input. Myers noted Georgia law states that the board's role is to establish policy and the superintendent's role is to execute it.

"My point is that the new board members had zero input into this policy" to pursue renewing the SPLOST, Myers said. " Not only have the new members been left out of the process, I don't know if the old members had input in the process."

Asked to respond to that assertion, Lewis said via an email from Valerie Fuller, the district's communications director, that "a notification was sent from the Board Chair on December 10th to all board members, including the incoming board members, notifying them of a special called meeting on December 17th for the purpose of introducing and providing input into the proposed 2015 SPLOST Projects List.

"The list was based on previous deferred projects due to shortfall in collections, school surveys, local school councils and support organizations."

Myers countered, "He's admitting that the project list was completed by the time he notified us of the meeting. I attended that meeting at his request, and I was never asked, nor was any other new board member asked for their opinion on anything, and I certainly wasn't asked privately."

Thomas said, "I think it's a foregone conclusion that the superintendent already has the votes. I don't think he would even have floated the idea unless he knew he had support from the right people."

Kia Chambers, the board's lone county-wide representative, is the other new member who was elected last year. She wasn't reached for comment.

Asked for his reaction to NoSchoolBoardTax.com, board chairman Rob Varner of District 5 said in an email, "I suppose putting up the site prior to board authorization is an attempt to influence, and scare, some board members who may be on the fence about the SPLOST."

Lewis dismissed its potential impact.

"I don't put any credence in anonymous websites," the superintendent said in another email from the communications director. "My focus is to continue with our schools to build on this past year's success, empower our students for their future and the betterment of our community. The best is yet to come, and if the Board approves a recommendation for a SPLOST, I look forward to sharing factual information with our community in the weeks ahead."

Mark Rice, 706-576-6272. Follow Mark on Twitter@MarkRiceLE.

This story was originally published January 14, 2015 at 5:52 PM with the headline "Two school board members help launch anti-SPLOST website before referendum authorized."