FRANKLIN—The Franklin School Board will meet next week to discuss bridging a $142,000 gap in funding from the city.

The meeting time has yet to be announced.

The schools’ $13.6 million budget includes a 2 or 3 percent bonus for teachers and an additional teaching position at S.P. Morton Elementary School. It also cuts in half how much it will pay for students to take classes at Paul D. Camp Community College, but doesn’t call for job cuts.

If the city’s proposed budget is approved during its 7 p.m. Monday, June 25, meeting, it will include the same $4.8 million in school funding as last year plus $142,758 in leftover money from the 2010-2011 budget.

The schools originally wanted $598,000 more than the city offered, but once the state approved its budget, the schools got an extra $312,000.

School Finance Director Rachel Yates told the board Thursday that Superintendent Dr. Michelle Belle, who was absent due to illness, had suggested the group meet before June 30 – when the budget must be finalized – to discuss ways to close the gap.

School Board Member Edna King agreed, noting that a budget decision should include Board Chairman Bill Scarboro and Vice Chairwoman Mona Murphy before they complete their terms in July.

“I would like to declare that we could meet later next week,” King said. “I would like us to bring closure to this before these people exit.”

In other business the school board:

• Ordered English textbooks for Franklin High and J.P. King Middle schools for $161,378

• Declared Thursday, July 5, a holiday for employees

• Learned Students of the Month for May were Franklin High School’s Brandyn Shelly, the son of Iris Shelly, J.P. King’s Larry Blow, the son of Larry Blow Sr.; and S.P. Morton’s Phloann Brown, the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. Anthony Davis

• Learned schools raised $2,227 for March of Dimes