Boone County Schools Superintendent Jeff Huffman makes a presentation to the county school board and about 250 audience members at a meeting Monday at Scott High School, in Madison. Facing a state takeover by the end of the day, county board members voted 5-0 to accept state-mandated budget cuts.
MADISON, W.Va. — Boone County school board members finally voted Monday to severely cut their 556 employees’ pay and benefits, averting a West Virginia Board of Education takeover that loomed if the county had refused a third time to make the state-ordered cuts.
The unanimous vote, taken before an audience of about 250 people in the gymnasium of Scott High School, means Boone’s public school employees — previously second to Putnam County for average school worker pay — will each lose thousands of dollars in annual pay, and their employer-paid dental and vision insurance coverage. Retirees also will lose that coverage.
The state school board had threatened to make the cuts anyway, if the county board refused again…