Recent legislation set to go into effect July 1 will see the Regional Office of Education getting a significant amount of money back from the state.

House Bill 4326 concerns the school facility occupation tax that passed separately in Randolph and Monroe counties, respectively.

The law amends county code so one percent of school facility occupation taxes go to regional superintendents for administrative expenses.

Monroe-Randolph County Regional Office of Education Superintendent Kelton Davis said the counties send two percent of the funds from those taxes to the Illinois Department of Revenue.

Davis said the change effectively amounts to half of what is sent to the IDOR — usually more than $50,000 each year — returning to the counties.

He emphasized that there would be no real changes at the local level, as the relevant tax increases for each county have already been decided nearly a decade ago.

“No changes locally to our taxing, no increase of taxes, no diminishment of tax receipts to our schools,” Davis said. “That’s very important, because I don’t want it to sound like we are a part of imposing a new tax or taking money away from our schools. It is the state getting less.”

Davis added that the newly available funds would be used for “direct services” like student services or education.

Davis also said these funds are unrelated to his previous recent requests for an additional assistant superintendent position to help manage the variety of programming the ROE manages.