All full-time Richland 2 employees will be receiving a $1,000 bonus

Richland 2 employees will be receiving a bonus.

All full-time employees will receive a $1,000 bonus after taxes and part-time employees will receive a $500 bonus after taxes, the board unanimously approved at a Tuesday meeting.

To make sure employees keep roughly $1,000 or $500 after taxes, the district will pay $1,580 to full time employees and $789 to part-time employees. The bonuses will cost Richland 2 roughly $6.45 million, board member Lashonda McFadden said during the meeting.

District financial officials will announce later this week when teachers will receive the bonuses, said Richland 2 spokeswoman Libby Roof.

The $6.45 million will come from the $11.3 million budget surplus from last fiscal year, according to board documents. With the remaining money, Richland 2 will place $3.5 million to the building fund and $1.35 million into the fund balance, documents show.

The point of moving money into the building fund is to reduce the need to borrow money when the district needs to improve or repair buildings, according to the board documents.

This is the second year in a row Richland 2 employees have received a $1,000 or $500 bonus paid for by a budget surplus. Last year, the bonuses were decided upon in January, before the COVID-19 pandemic upended districts’ budgets.