MONROE — Residents in the Monroe Local Schools will not have to reapprove tax levies they adopted while part of the Middletown/Monroe Schools.

        This week the 12th District Court of Appeals ruled in favor of the Monroe Board of Education, which had filed suit last summer asking the court to order budget commissions in Butler and Warren counties to certify the tax rates in place as a joint school district. On July 1, the two districts separated.

        At stake is about 80 percent of the Monroe Schools' budget.

        “Our residents voted on those taxes. Now we'll be able to collect on them,” said Monroe Superintendent Arnol Elam. “It will enable us to prepare a five-year forecast. This gives us a lot of information we didn't have before.”

        School officials had con tended that case law showed a precedent for carrying over the taxes from the joint district to the separated district. However, the Ohio Department of Taxation told school officials they had to put the millage to a vote of the residents of the new district and gain approval before money could be collect ed.

        “This is just one more problem we don't need to deal with,” said Suzi Rubin, a member of Monroe's school board. “We would have had to put the levy on the May ballot.”

        The ruling will allow the district to put its focus back on facilities, Mrs. Rubin said. Educators are trying to decide whether to build a new campus for grades kindergarten through 12, build a new high school, or remodel existing buildings.

        The matter will be discussed at a public meeting at 7 p.m. Dec. 12 at the junior/senior high school.

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