Nearly every day, a newspaper somewhere in the country is carrying a story about the success of our clients’ energy conservation programs. Below are just a few examples of the great work they are doing, and the privilege it is to serve them in such tangible, noteworthy ways.
By Lacey Walters
— Over the past 18 months the Jones County School District, with the help of Energy Education Inc., has saved over $330,000 in utility costs. That savings has helped alleviate the rising cost in fuel for school buses. A representative from EEI assessed every school in the district and offered many energy saving tips to the schools. Cutting air conditioning units and heaters to a degree that would not allow them to turn on when no one was at school and cutting off all lights except those used for security purposes are just a few of many suggestions given by the EEI representative. “He inspects and makes sure our air conditioners are set at a level where they only come on if someone is occupying the building. It saves us the 10 to 12 hours that people are not there,” said Jones County School District Superintendent Thomas Prine. “We are doing everything we can to save tax payers money.” “We are very cognizant about saving everywhere we can and it makes a big difference,” he continued. “We use that money to put back in to technology, instructional supplies for teachers and transportation.” The Jones County School District is the eighth largest district in the state and has a budget of $1.2 million for utilities to run one of the largest transportation fleets with 110 bus routes. Prine said that the district has made great strides over the past 10 years to improve the bus fleet, but the September bond issue, if approved, would allow for better efforts. “The beauty of this facilities plan is that right now we are not compromising all our money in the district just to have good school facilities. Actually, this bond issue would free up money that normally would be spent on buildings that we can buy new buses and improve our transportation fleet,” Prine said. With gas prices on the rise, the Jones County School District has made many efforts to save money. “The increase (in fuel costs) was offset to a large degree by the assets we were able to save from our utilities,” Prine said. The Jones County School District will be recognized at the next board meeting for being the school district with the most savings in south Mississippi.
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