School district rejects property tax hike

For the second time in two years, voters in the Coeur d’Alene School District rejected a proposal to increase property taxes to pay for a new middle school.

The $31.1 million levy would have replaced Lakes Middle School, built the district’s 11th elementary school, funded districtwide technology upgrades and purchased property for future school sites.

But with 11 of 20 polling sites reporting, and 3,400 ballots counted, 48 percent of voters had said yes.

The two-year levy, which would have cost homeowners an estimated $1.60 per year for every $1,000 of a home’s assessed value, needed 55 percent approval to pass.

“I’m not going to give up hope yet, but I would say I’m sort of cautiously pessimistic,” said Hazel Bauman, assistant superintendent and next year’s schools chief. “We’ll just have to retool.”

Voters approved a $23 million levy in 2002 that included $7.7 million to remodel the 56-year-old Lakes Middle School, but soaring construction costs sent the money to other projects.

This year, a group of self-styled watchdogs, led by political activists Mary Souza and Dan Gookin, rallied voters through mailings and Web postings to reject the levy, pointing to the 2002 levy as evidence the district can’t be trusted with taxpayer money.

The district has $4.5 million left over from the 2002 levy that will go to Lakes once the rest of the money is approved.

In school board elections, incumbent Sid Fredrickson was fending off a challenge from roofing contractor Kevin Mylan with four of six polling places counted. Fredrickson had 55 percent of the approximately 400 ballots counted.

With just one of six polling places counted in the zone 4 races, incumbent Diane Zipperer was trailing former University of Idaho professor Susan Francis, 41 percent to 59 percent.

Bauman said rebuilding trust with the public will be a big part of the district’s regrouping efforts.

“We’ll just have to figure out what it is that they’ll support,” Bauman said. “Whether we win or we lose, we need to be really aware that there has been some missteps and there has been some loss of public trust.”