ROCKY MOUNT -- For the first time in years, employees of Franklin County schools will not receive annual salary increases.

Usually, employees get a step increase and a cost of living increase, Superintendent Charles Lackey said. But not next school year.

Lackey laid out budget cuts and increases Tuesday night at a public hearing held by the Franklin County School Board on the 2009-10 budget for the school system.

About 30 parents, teachers and community leaders gathered to hear the bleak and uncertain proposal.

Because of no salary increases, Leanne Worley, president of the Franklin County Education Association, said her organization could not endorse the budget.

"But we understand the decision they [the school board] had to make considering the economic situation," she said.

Lackey said feedback has not been positive, but the move is being made all over the state -- not just in Franklin County.

Overall, the $80 million budget is about $516,000 less than the 2008-09 budget.

The district was preparing for a $3.9 million cut in funding, but that could change as soon as the district's piece of the federal stimulus package trickles down.

"It's going to make a difference," Lackey said. "We just don't know how much yet. We have to operate with the information we have right now." While there will be no salary increases for personnel, funding increases are proposed for textbooks and supplies, computer software, the Virginia Preschool Initiative program and utilities.

Other increases are proposed in employee health insurance and staffing related to the opening of Windy Gap Elementary School this fall.

Other than the money for Windy Gap -- about $1.2 million previously set aside for the school -- most increases were absorbed by other cuts, Lackey said.

Aside from the budget, the school district is requesting an additional $4.9 million for school upgrades, including air conditioning for 10 schools, new school buses and a new roof for the high school gym.

Of that request, at least $1.1 million comes from the existing school capital fund in the county budget.

Usually the school system requests additional funding from the Franklin County Board of Supervisors each budget year, but for the next fiscal year, Lackey is hoping for the same amount of funding from the county, state and federal sources as this year.

On Monday, the school board will vote on the budget, and the supervisors are scheduled to do the same on April 28.

The school system's budget constitutes about 63 percent of the county budget.

The next public hearing is scheduled for March 29, when the supervisors take up the budget.