The Effingham County Board of Education incumbents all have declared their intention to run again for their seats.

District 3 member and board chairman Lamar Allen, District 2 member Troy Alford and District 5 member Vickie Decker will seek another four-year term. Allen and Alford have served on the school board for 12 years, and Decker is an eight-year veteran of the board.

“I just feel like I’ve got a little bit left to do,” said Allen.

Those three school board seats are up for election next year, but the incumbents decided to make their announcements this summer.

Allen and Alford were first elected to the school board in 2004. Decker was appointed to the school board to fill the unexpired term of her sister Vera Jones, who moved out of the district she was representing then, and won election to the seat full-time.

Allen added the school system’s success helped lead him to make the decision to run again and gave credit to the system’s personnel.

“I think what’s happened in our school system and what is still happening in our school system is we have a great staff,” he said, “and that’s part of what we do to keep our schools in the shape they’re in now. We’ve always worked well as a board. I feel like it’s a good working situation with everybody.”

Allen also said he was proud of what the board has accomplished, and many people encouraged him to run again.

“That’s a very rewarding thing, to have people come and ask you to run again,” he said.

Enrollment at Effingham County schools is up by 300, and Allen said if the current pace keeps up, the system will have to build more schools. The passage of the next round of the educational special purpose local option sales tax will be crucial for the new facilities, according to Allen.

“It’s good that people are wanting to come here,” he said. “But it is going to be a challenge the next four or five years if they keeping coming here to build new schools.”