Tally of voter-approved supplemental school levies since ‘07 tops $1 billion

Since July 1, 2007, Idaho’s school districts have backfilled their budgets with more than $1 billion in supplemental property tax levies, Kevin Richert of Idaho Education News report. These short-term, voter-approved levies – property tax increases – have steadily grown over that time period; 91 of Idaho’s 115 school districts had a supplemental levy on the books in 2013-14, up from 59 districts in 2006-07, the budget year that ended on June 30, 2007.

Richert reports that the growth of the supplemental levies occurred as the state was cutting K-12 funding, and using money from the federal economic stimulus package to pick up some of the slack; but the locally passed supplemental levies replaced only a fraction of the money cut from state funding. His full report, including comments from candidates for governor and state school superintendent, is online here .