Schools seeking levy input
Every two years for the past 20 years, voters in the Coeur d’Alene School District have approved supplemental levies to pay for school programs and positions not funded by state money.
But given a climate of tax relief in Kootenai County and the overwhelming rejection of the district’s school building construction levy proposed last March, some school officials worry that voters won’t be so generous when faced with another supplemental levy next spring.
The school board has recommended next year’s levy – which needs a simple majority to pass – to be less than the expiring $14.6 million levy approved in 2005.
Teachers and other district employees have already had their chance to weigh in on what should, and shouldn’t, be funded. Now, it’s everyone else’s turn.
A survey on the district Web site lists programs and employee positions – such as the Trail Creek outdoor school program, the special education paraprofessional positions and the remediation programs – and asks which should be maintained, cut or eliminated.
“It’s an effort to listen to the people,” said Vern Newby, chairman of the school board.
This is the first time the community will be formally surveyed before the school board setting a levy amount.
After the $40 million building construction levy failed in March, a committee formed to see what could be done to bolster community support. The two main suggestions were getting more input from the community on what the levy should fund and, once the levy amount has been decided, making it clearer to the public what the money will pay for.
One problem with school levies is the sheer number of them, school board member Christie Wood said at a recent meeting. Voters get confused over the differences between a supplemental levy and a construction levy and don’t understand that one is a standard, biennial proposal while the other is the only way to fund school construction in the state.
None of the supplemental levy money can go to construction – it all must go to school programs.
“This levy’s pretty critical,” Wood said.
District officials have called the supplemental levy “the lifeblood” of the school district, but support for the levies has shown signs of faltering.
The levies in 2001 and 2003 passed with more than 70 percent approval, funding things like remediation programs for struggling students. The current levy, which helped pay for the International Baccalaureate diploma programs at the high schools and for updated textbooks, among other things, squeaked by in 2005 with about 55 percent of the vote. Then in March of this year, voters rejected the school construction levy, which needed 55 percent approval to pass but got just 45 percent.
The district will not seek another construction levy next year per the suggestion of the long-range planning committee, which recommended concentrating on only the supplemental levy.
The school board will have the final say on how much the levy will be for and what it will fund.