Hall County Schools Superintendent Will Schofield will continue to lead the school district for another three years.

On Monday, the Hall County Board of Education extended the superintendent’s contract the maximum allowable by state law. Schofield is in his fourth year as the superintendent of the 26,000-student system.

“Will’s done a great job,” said Richard Higgins, Hall County school board chairman . “We look forward to working with him for many years to come.”

The board also evaluated its financial standing as it prepares to build the budget for fiscal year 2011, which starts July 1. While revenues are lagging slightly, expenditures are down, administrators said.

Lee Lovett, deputy superintendent of Hall County schools, said the district is halfway into its fiscal year 2010 budget, and has spent 44.7 percent of that roughly $200 million budget.

“When taking into account (teacher) furloughs, we’re about $5 million below expenditures for this year,” Schofield said.

Lovett said the district has collected 82.6 percent of its property tax revenues for this year, whereas this time last year, it had collected 80.4 percent of revenues. He said, however, that with the $4.5 million Homeowners’ Tax Relief Grant unfunded this year, revenue collections are running slightly behind last year’s.

“If you take that tax relief into consideration, we’re running about 2.5 to 3 percent behind last year,” he said.

The board also discussed opening West Hall High School’s bilingual diploma program to capable high school students districtwide.

Schofield said the program nurtures dual Spanish and English speakers in high-level courses.

The board granted the 1 cent special-purpose local option sale tax funds to several maintenance projects.

The board approved $30,000 in SPLOST funds to replace the roof of Lyman Hall Elementary’s library.

In addition, the board approved $120,000 to repair rooftop units at Johnson High School and $13,600 to install a bus and car canopy at White Sulphur Springs Elementary.