Kilgore, TX — School trustees here are dealing with a $1.5 million shortfall in a proposed spending plan for 2012-13 that includes a 3 percent pay raise for all employees.

Trustees this week got their first look at the preliminary $25 million spending plan that must be approved by Sept. 1.

“We’re expecting our property values to go down about $30 million,” Assistant Superintendent for Business Revard Pfeffer told the board Monday.

Property values for portions of the district in Gregg and Rusk counties are estimated at just less than $1.6 billion, though Pfeffer said the number should rise as values are finalized by mid-summer.

If the ad valorem tax rate stays the same, property taxes should generate about $17 million, he said.

Read more from the Longview News-Journal here.