A budget impasse is delaying the start of schools in Sumner County. Classes were supposed to resume Monday. The School Board and County Commission are over $7 million apart and families are caught in the middle. The day started for thousands of Sumner County families learning school is out indefinitely.

"The 2 sides are so far apart on budget that it would be irresponsible to begin school knowing that we may have to make potential cuts to our classrooms, cuts that would certainly effect students," says Jeremy Johnson, Sumner County Schools.

The news comes as many families are buying back to school supplies. For parents like Nancy Batson, who has a son in elementary school, the need for notebooks and backpacks is now taking a back seat to childcare.

"Camps and things like that have ended and it's gonna be hard, very hard for working parents, for working mothers especially," says Batson.

"This is just not acceptable," says Sumner County Mayor Anthony Holt.

Mayor Holt has called a special meeting of the County Commission for Monday night. He says it's a numbers game and the relationship between the School Board and County Commission is dysfunctional.

"To get additional revenue is going to require the County Commission to pass something that would require an increase in the tax rate and I don't know that our Commissioners are willing to do that," says Mayor Holt.

Misty Leininger has a daughter in middle school, and she's willing to pay higher taxes to keep schools moving forward.

"I do wish it could have been handled in a way that didn't make the kids have to miss school," says Leininger. "But you know, sometimes you gotta do what you gotta do."

This isn't the first time in the past 10 years the start of school for one Midstate system has been delayed. In 2008, a judge stepped in to get class underway in Cumberland County.Budget Brawl Delays Classes in Sumner County