By Johnny Jackson
jjackson@henryherald.com

State Sen. Gail Buckner (D-Jonesboro), on Monday, railed against state legislators for their handling of the current state budget.

“The approach being taken at the legislature right now is unacceptable as far as I’m concerned,” said Buckner, during a phone interview. She said members of the General Assembly could do more to reduce budget deficits, and increase tax revenue, by passing House Bill 1137, which has been dubbed the “point of sales tax collection” bill.

“House Bill 1137 would help resolve the funding shortfall,” she said. The measure was sponsored by fellow Democrat, State Rep. DuBose Porter, of Dublin, Ga.

Buckner said the “point of sales tax collection” bill, currently under review in the House Ways & Means Committee, is based on a state study to identify businesses that do not pay sales taxes to the state. She said a pilot survey conducted in the cities of Valdosta, and Gainesville, revealed that between a fifth and a quarter of businesses were not properly reporting sales taxes to the state.

“Somewhere between 20 and 25 percent of the businesses in the study were not sending sales tax revenue to the State Department of Revenue,” Buckner said. “They’re stealing from the state, and they’re stealing from their fellow citizens.”

The proposed point of sales tax collection bill requires businesses to operate under a sales-and-use tax identification number, so they can be held accountable for sales taxes, Buckner said, adding that her belief is that as much as $1 billion in sales taxes could be recovered annually.

By doing so, she said, government officials would be able to slow the hemorrhaging of tax revenues at the state level, and stop funding cuts to education.

Buckner said she plans to discuss House Bill 1137, along with other education and finance-related concerns this week. She is scheduled to host a town hall meeting at 10 a.m., Saturday, at the Henry County School Systems Administration Office Auditorium, at 396 Tomlinson Street, in McDonough.

During the meeting, she said, she will recognize Henry County Schools’ Teachers of the Years, as well as its HERO (Henry Employee Recognition Observance) awardees.

Henry County Schools Superintendent Michael Surma also will be on hand to present information about the school system’s involvement in the federal Race to the Top Program. Georgia was recently selected as a finalist, by the U.S. Department of Education, for the first round of federal “Race to the Top” grants, which would give the state up to $462 million, over four years, to implement school improvement plans.

The grants, part of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA), are available to states that demonstrate elements of innovations and reforms in education.

Surma said Henry County is one of 23 school systems in the state that will receive a small portion of funding from the federal program to help continue existing programs.

“It will help us focus on which programs we want to work on,” Surma said. “And, hopefully, we’ll be able to work with those 22 school systems, the state and the federal government to provide quality education to public school students across the state of Georgia.”