Voters in Southern Tier school districts are giving sound approval to proposed budgets while electing slates of new or returning school board members.

All the districts in the region passed their spending plans with Owego-Apalachin, Harpursville and Susquehanna Valley among those reporting overwhelming approval. School bus purchases and library funding proposals were also approved by voters in many of the districts.

New York State holds school districts to a tax levy increase of no more than 2.27% without get more than a two-thirds vote approval from residents.

Owego-Apalachin’s $52.8-million proposal may have been an easier sell than some others since the budget carried a tax levy increase of zero-point-zero-zero percent.  Voters in the O-A school district also gave the okay to a $12.9 million capital Project in a vote of 609 to 287.