Cobb school budget, social media and public comment policies OK'd

The Cobb Board of Education on Thursday adopted a fiscal year 2022 budget of $1.5 billion that includes an employee pay raise.

The vote was passed without discussion as part of the board’s consent agenda on Thursday night. The raises range from 4 percent to 8.6 percent for full-time and other non-temporary employees.

The budget proposal proposes holding the line on the school district’s property tax rate of 18.9 mills and using $51 million in reserve funding to reach a balance (budget summary here).

Unlike FY 2021, there’s no federal CARES Act funding. Also projected for FY 2022, which begins on July 1, is a 5.54 percent growth in the Cobb tax digest.

More Cobb school district budget and financial data can be found by clicking here.

During a work session Thursday afternoon, the school board adopted a new social media policy that governs public comments by district employees (you can read it here).

The policy states that “District employees must use Social Media respectfully and ethically to avoid harming the reputations and careers of themselves and colleagues, as well as the reputation of the District and the education profession as a whole.”

One provision would prohibit employees “from making statements on crisis situations or emergencies on behalf of the District without appropriate permission from the District’s Communications department or District leadership.”

Teachers and other employees also will not be allowed to make or accept online connection requests with students, message with them or post photos or videos of students on their personal social media accounts.

Employees will be allowed and encouraged to post “good news/what’s happening at your school” news, event reminders, congratulating students and colleagues and making notifications, including for emergencies.

Also Thursday, the school board voted 4-3 to require members of the public who wish to speak during public comment periods at board meetings to sign up online.

The public will be invited back to attend board meetings for the first time since February 2020, before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Cobb property owners and parents, students and other stakeholders in the Cobb school district are allowed to speak during public comment.

The new registration policy will continue a 30-minute public comment policy before each board meeting, with up to 15 speakers addressing the board for two minutes each.

Public speakers will still have to show a photo ID once they arrive for the public comment period, and those who didn’t make the cut will be placed on a standby list.

“If you’re not who you signed up as, you won’t be allowed to speak,” said said Cobb superintendent Chris Ragsdale, who said the move was done as a courtesy to the public.

The board’s three Democrats voted against the new measure, expressing concern that the policy also includes a provision for the board chairman to prioritize speakers, especially if an item is on the meeting agenda.

Tre Hutchins, one of the three Democrats, wondered what would happen to those who wanted to speak about changing the name of Wheeler High School, an issue that the board’s four-member GOP majority has declined to place on the agenda.

Ragsdale said the first 15 people allowed to speak, first-come, first-serve, regardless of topic.