County Has At Least $2.6 Million Unspent From SPLOST 2004, Report Shows

Oconee County has at least $2.6 million in unspent Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax revenues from the 2004 tax initiative as the Board of Commissioners begins preparing voters to approve a new sales tax in May of 2014.

The current tax, SPLOST 2009, runs through October of 2015, and, as of June 30 of this year, the county had spent less than half of the projected revenue from that tax. Revenue is running behind projections, however, and the county has tried to hold spending to about 80 percent of projections.
 
The largest unspent category in the 2004 SPLOST is for county facilities, which could include some funding for a new judicial facility or courthouse, and the county has spent less than $1 million from the $4.6 million set aside in the referendum for county facilities.

The county has overspent in other categories, such as for water and sewer projects.

These figures come from the legally required report of SPLOST funding through June 30, 2013. The actual report must be published in the county’s legal organ, The Oconee Enterprise, by the end of the year.

For details on this story and information on requests pending for SPLOST 2015, go to Oconee County Observations.