The Oconee County Board of Education on Monday approved a contract with Georgia Leadership Associates (GLA) of Folkston to help it find the next superintendent of Oconee County Schools.
Board Chair Michael Ransom said after the meeting that he expects Allan McCannon from GLA to join the Board next week in executive session to begin the process.
“The Board will be the search committee for Oconee County Schools,” Ransom said, and GLA will help “facilitate” that process by identifying and recruiting appropriate candidates.
The Board went into an executive session at the end of its work session on Monday that lasted just more than 100 minutes.
Ransom said the Board dealt with end-of-year personnel changes in that unusually long executive session and “brainstormed on what the next steps need to be” in the superintendent search.
Ransom said the Board did not name an interim superintendent and will turn to that task later.
The Board was scheduled to review its Fiscal Year 2026 Budget at the meeting on Monday, but Chief Financial Officer Peter Adams told the Board he had not yet received the tax digest from Oconee County Tax Commissioner Jennifer Riddle.
Adams told the Board it has the option of estimating the tax digest, or the value of taxable property in the county, as it has in the past, but he preferred to have the final digest before presenting the budget.
Last year, the Board adopted a tentative budget on May 13 based on an estimated tax digest, held the required budget hearings on May 22 and June 3, and adopted the final budget on June 10.
News Release
Oconee County Schools Communications Director Steven Colquitt put a news release on the Oconee County Schools web site at 6:32 p.m., or immediately after the Board adjourned its meeting and went into executive session, announcing the selection of GLA as the search firm by the Board.
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The announcement also said that the Board expects to have an interim superintendent in place by July 1.
Superintendent Jason Branch announced his decision to retire effective June 30 at the Board meeting on April 14.
“The Board of Education understands the significance of this search and is dedicated to a thorough process to ensure a Superintendent is selected who will best serve our students, staff, and community for years to come," Ransom is quoted as saying in that news release.
“The Board is committed to a search that attracts top-tier candidates and to identifying the most highly qualified individual to lead our district,” the quote in the news release continues.
The news release said the Board will solicit input from school employees and community members “to help establish a candidate profile” for the superintendent.
In my telephone conversation with Ransom at 9:30 on Monday, he emphasized that the role of GLA would be advisory to the Board, with the Board making the final decision
Selection Of Firm
In the meeting on Monday, Justin Cofer, Chief Human Resources Officer for Oconee County Schools, said the Board had directed him to identify search firms it could use top help with the search for a new superintendent.
He said “the two most prominent agencies operating in the state of Georgia” are the Georgia School Board Association and GLA.
“After your careful consideration of both firms,” Cofer said, “and a review of the provided MOU by the school attorney, we bring forward tonight an action item at your request to formally approve Georgia Leadership Associates as the selected search agency to assist in identifying the next superintendent for Oconee County Schools.”
Ransom, in our telephone conversation, said GLA is made up mostly of former superintendents who will be able to help the Board identify "good applicants before they are snatched up" by other systems.
The firm is based in Folkston in the far southeast of the state.
McCannon, whom Ransom said will work with the Oconee County School Board, was superintendent of the Madison County School System, according to his Linkedin posting.
Budget Delay
Adams told the Board that “Due to a statewide software challenge in the Tax Commissioner’s Office, the tax digest numbers have not yet been finalized.”
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“As a result, this critical data is not currently available,” he said, “and we are unable to present the tentative budget as planned this evening.”
“We have been in regular communication with our Tax Commissioner, who has been very responsive, and is working diligently to provide us with the necessary information as soon as it becomes available,” he said.
“The tax digest is a key factor in accurately projecting our revenue for the upcoming fiscal year,” Adams said. “Proceeding without it would be premature and could result in inaccuracies that we want to avoid.”
“We remain committed to transparency and accuracy in our budgeting process,” he said. “Once we have received the finalized tax digest data, we will adjust our schedule and insure that the tentative budget is brought before the Board in a timely manor for review and discussion.”
Board Response
In response to a question from Board Member Adam Hammond about the deadline for passing a budget, Adams said “We’ll have to have a discussion with you about just doing what we have in the past in just projecting the revenue and move forward.”
“But with the changes in HB 581,” Adams said, “we thought it would be prudent to see what the tax digest numbers came out to be so we could accurately predict what the rollback rates will be.”
House Bill 581 set in place a new statewide floating homestead exemption, but the Board of Education voted in early February to opt out of that exemption.
This decision by the School Board requires Oconee County Tax Commissioner Jennifer Riddle to compute a different tax digest for school taxes from that computed for the other governing bodies in the county, none of which opted out if the floating homestead exemption.
That tax digest calculation also affects computation of the rollback rate, or the reduction in the tax (millage) rate that is required to fully offset inflation and avoid a tax increase.
Video
The video below is recorded from the rear of the Board Chamber, as is required by Communications Director Colquitt.
Cofer made his report to the Board at 21:22 in the video.
Adams made his report on the budget delay at 26:59 in the video.
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