It looks like Coffee County property owners are headed for an increase on taxes. The Coffee County Budget and Finance Committee has voted to suggest a property tax hike of 32-cents to cover a shortfall from last year’s county budget and extra money needed for the upcoming budget. 10 cents of this 32-cent increase is due to the $1 million pulled out of last year’s fund balance to avoid a tax increase last year, so nearly one third of the amount has nothing to do with this year’s increases.
17 cents of the tax increase is for the new county jail that will be completed by August and opening fully by the first of the year. This will keep the workhouse open as well. The workhouse is the portion of the old jail where low-risk inmates sentenced to the work detail program are housed. Sheriff Steve Graves says the new jail is not being built to include a work detail, and that any work detail program must be conducted in a completely separate facility from the jail itself.
3 cents for the increase in jail medical costs. The overrun on this year’s budget will be around $300,000.
Graves has said on WMSR several times that jail medical costs are mostly because of inmate fights. Graves says that the main reason for this is the overcrowded cells, which often have 30 or 40 inmates in a cell designed for 16.
The remaining 2 cents is for step raises and minor budget increases in various departments.
We reported recently that the county school system was asking for around extra $800,000. Director, Dr. LaDonna McFall is now asking for a much lower amount of $93,000. One of the main reasons for the lower amount is that money needed for buses will come out of the Rural Debt Service fund instead of the school budget. This move will keep the county from having to match funds with city school systems.
The full commission meets at 6 p.m. Tuesday at the Coffee County Administrative Plaza at 1329 McArthur St. in Manchester.

The Tennessee Highway Patrol is urging motorists not to leave children or pets in unattended vehicles, especially as summer temperatures begin to rise.
Preliminary reports indicate that eight children have already died this year due to heat stroke. None of those fatalities were in Tennessee.
According to the latest statistics, there were 44 heat stroke deaths involving children in the United States in 2013.
Experts say the temperature inside a car can reach potentially deadly levels within minutes on a typical summer day.
Tennessee is among 20 states that have laws that prohibit leaving a child unattended in a vehicle.

The popular ACT college admissions exam is broadening how it reports students’ scores.
The exam’s traditional 36-point scale remains unchanged. But, starting next year, students will also receive an ACT score on two new “readiness indicators” reflecting how they did in terms of career readiness and understanding complex text, the nonprofit testing organization announced Friday.
A new category will offer students a separate score on STEM performance – short for science, technology, engineering and math – that combines the science and math portions. A second new category in the area of language arts combines how they did on the English, reading and writing portions – for those who took the writing portion.
The writing portion remains optional for traditional Saturday morning test takers, but the ACT said the writing section is also being modified to make the essay topics more advanced and to require test takers to potentially provide multiple perspectives on a topic, instead of just one view.
The announcement comes three months after the College Board, which operates the competing SAT, announced sweeping changes to that exam that include moving the perfect score back to 1,600, making the essay optional and shifting the vocabulary away from some high-sounding words in favor of those more likely to be used in school or on the job. The changes are expected in 2016.
The ACT said that on June 14, a Saturday, just under 600,000 students are scheduled to take the exam – a record high.