The Pike County and City of Troy governments are officially participating with the 14th annual “Back to School” sales tax holiday this weekend only on select school supplies.

The annual tax holiday will begin at 12:01 a.m. on Friday and last until midnight Sunday.

During this period certain school-related items will be exempt from local and state sales taxes, helping parents get a bit more bang for their buck.

All “human wearing apparel suitable for general use” costing less than $100 per article is exempt from the taxes. This does not include clothing accessories such as sunglasses, watches, hair bows, etc. It also does not include protective equipment such as breathing masks and hard hats or sporting or recreational equipment such as sporting gloves and band instruments.

Computers, computer software and supplies are also exempt as a single purchase of $750 or less.

For purposes of the exemption, a computer may include a laptop, desktop, or tower computer system which consists of a central processing unit (CPU), and devices such as a display monitor, keyboard, mouse, and speakers sold as a computer package. Computer parts and devices not sold as part of a package with the CPU will not qualify for the exemption.

The all-inclusive list of exempts computer supplies is:

• Computer Storage Media; diskettes, compact disks
• Handheld electronic schedulers, except devices that are cellular phones
• Personal digital assistants, except devices that are cellular phones
• Computer Printers
• Printer Supplies for Computers (printer paper, printer ink)

All school supplies, school art supplies and instructional material of a sales price of $50 or less per item are exempt.

Exempt school supplies include:

• Binders
• Blackboard Chalk
• Book Bags
• Calculators
• Cellophane Tape
• Compasses
• Composition Books
• Crayons
• Erasers
• Folders (expandable, pocket, plastic and manila)
• Glue, paste, and paste sticks
• Highlighters
• Index Cards
• Index Card Boxes
• Legal Pads
• Lunch Boxes
• Markers
• Notebooks
• Paper (loose leaf ruled notebook paper, copy paper, graph paper, tracing paper, manila paper, colored paper, poster board, and construction paper)
• Pencil Boxes and Other School Supply Boxes
• Pencil Sharpeners
• Pencils
• Pens
• Protractors
• Rulers
• Scissors
• Writing Tablets

Exempt school art supplies include:

• Clay & Glazes
• Paints (Acrylic, Tempora and Oil)
• Paintbrushes for artwork
• Sketch and Drawing Pads
• Watercolors

Exempt instructional materials include:

• Reference Maps and Globes
• Required Textbooks on an official school book list with a sales price of more than $30 and less than $50

All books $30 or less are also exempt for sales tax. This does not include magazines, newspapers or periodicals.