The Effingham County Board of Education has set a budget of $86 million for the 2010 fiscal year.

Total planned revenue in the budget is $86,073,056. Of that, $26,410,294 is expected to come from property taxes.

The state also has cut the equalization grant the system normally receives by almost $4 million. The budget was reduced by $7,436 from the revised 2009 budget, and by $1,528,517 from the original 2009 budget.

Superintendent Randy Shearouse said the numbers have been adjusted as new information on cuts has come from the state.

“These numbers have continued to change a little based on some additional cuts the state has made, based on some information we’ve received,” he said. “But overall they remain fairly consistent from the time we began looking at the budget back at retreat until now. There’s not a lot of changes that have been made but a tweak here and there to make the budget works out as far as revenues and expenses.”

Total expenses are budgeted at $86,065,043 for the 2010 budget year.

“Most areas are seeing a decrease because of budget cuts,” Shearouse said.

Most grade level spending is being reduced, but there are increases in grades four and five as well as high school grades. Funding for special education and remedial education also will be increased. There will be an increase in state special education preschool and school administration. The expenses for nurses is also set to increase.

“We still don’t have concrete numbers on what that millage rate is going to be concerning rollback numbers,” Shearouse said.

He said there are some estimates the system has been given, and he feels the revenue is accurate for the year.

“We have not been able to promote our millage rate, and the county has not been able to do that either. We’ll have to come back later and adopt a millage rate,” he said. “That is something that is normally done by this time.”