Revenue from an extra penny for schools on the county sales tax rate has built more than a dozen new school buildings in DeKalb County in the past 20 years.
Less than half of the new DeKalb schools built by the Education Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax opened their doors in places where most students were affluent, an Atlanta Journal-Constitution data analysis showed.
The AJC found that most SPLOST-funded schools built by the three largest metro districts were built to serve more affluent student bodies. While many students benefit from SPLOST funds, others fall through the cracks. For example, the Cross Keys cluster of schools in DeKalb has dealt with major overcrowding and other problems for years, and critics say it’s past time for SPLOST funds to be used to solve the issue.
The percentage of children in DeKalb who are poor has risen significantly over the lifespan of the SPLOST program — from every other child in 1997 to nearly three children out of every four today.
Meanwhile, population growth has been a significant factor in where new schools are placed. Every new SPLOST school in DeKalb County was built inside or within a mile of a census tract where the population grew by 25 percent or more between 2000 and 2010, the AJC found.
Read more about how E-SPLOST funding is doled out, see a map of the locations of SPLOST-funded schools and check out interactive graphics with lots of other information onMyAJC.com.
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