The Walker County school board, with the assistance of the county, has taken out an $18 million bond to help pay for its expenses over the next five years.

The funds to pay the bond will be generated from a tax levy per a referendum passed by Walker County citizens as part of the ESPLOST vote in March 2011.

“Voters passed the ESPLOST last year, extending the schools’ one-cent sales tax add-on,” said Walker County commissioner Bebe Heiskell. “The vote included a referendum for a bond secured by the county. If sales tax were ever not enough, the school board would have to, by law, levy a property tax to pay the schools’ shortfall. By law, the Walker County commissioner would, by the Georgia state constitution, have to put that school bond levy on the tax bills. Under the Georgia constitution, both the commissioner and the school board have no choice but to do this because that is what the citizens voted in the referendum for us to do.”

Heiskell signed the county’s portion of the resolution during her regular commissioner’s meeting Thursday, March 15.

The bonds have already been sold to the market as tax-free municipal bonds.

Walker County schools expect to receive approximately $4.7 million per year in revenue from the tax.