The Hub City reacts as schools could lose millions due to City Council vote

JACKSON, Tenn– A big decision that has the wheels of the Hub City turning.

“It’s kind of a shock to hear this,” Rose Anderson said.

Thursday morning, the Jackson City Council will vote on whether the city will take back sales tax revenue it currently gives the Jackson-Madison County School System in an effort to balance its budget.

“The city is being greedy because the children need it,” Ashley Webb said.

“I have mixed emotions about it because the school needs so much as it is for today in the public school system and then on the flip side for the city people jobs are at stake,” Linda Neely said.

It is a proposal that has many who live in the Hub City and depend on the public school system to educate their children upset.

“Straight wrong. You need to take care of the children first. Without good raising of children you don’t have a good city,”  Webb said.

“The students will suffer and in turn the community suffers,” Janis Carroll said.

Without the money many fear changes for schools.

“The biggest chunk of the budget is personnel, so I think it’s going to come from personnel which could mean larger classrooms,” Carroll said.

“The buildings we inherited from the city, they still need maintenance and repair,” Anderson said.

Residents said there are other ways to get money for the city.

“The property taxes are pretty low, so it wouldn’t hurt to go up on property taxes,” Webb said.

Ultimately residents are saying it is time city leaders to make tough decisions.

“If the city has to cut jobs, like we had to let some people go, when we had to close schools, so it’s the same thing with the city,” Neely said.

“As we call it, cut the fluff out of some things,” Anderson said.