Last November, the Macon County Board of Education approved a $5000 campaign to educate voters into voting yes on a bond referendum. With the persuasiveness of a doctoral dissertation, the board spent tax dollars on signs that said, “Vote yes for children.” The bond would have given the school district a low-interest loan to build two new schools, but the taxpayers thought their money could go to better purposes. Then, the taxpayers voted down the real estate transfer tax, too. What’s more, they turned down the opportunity to let Macon County go into debt for a senior center, a recreation complex, a college building, and a new library. The pox on the Macon County taxpayers’ house is that the schools will now have to be built more on a pay-as-you-go basis with higher interest rates.

This is news because Colin Gooder was paying attention and registered a complaint with the State Board Elections. The results of the investigation, released last week, showed the Macon County School District neither formed a referendum committee nor disclosed campaign finance reports in a timely manner. Nothing was said about penalties.