Newport School District to regroup after bond fails: ‘I was expecting a better result’

Newport School District officials plan to regroup after voters rejected their bond proposal Tuesday.

While the district’s levy passed, it received only 46.3% support for its $46.3 million bond, far from the 60% needed to pass it

April Owens, board chair for the school district, said the bond likely failed because of people’s concerns of having to pay more taxes.

“I have to admit, I was expecting a better result,” Owens said. “I did think that we would be closer to that 60% than it was.”

The bond proposal focused primarily on modernizing Newport High School. This included upgrading the school’s heating, ventilation and air conditioning system, along with building an auxiliary gym, replacing the roof and improving science labs along with career and technical education areas.

The bond would have taxed property owners at a rate of $1.75 per $1,000 in assessed property value for up to 22 years. The school district’s last bond was approved in 2004 for Sadie Halstead Middle School.

The high school has seen issues with the HVAC system. In the weeks before the special election, a heating coil broke inside one of Newport High School’s classroom walls, flooding the room with an inch of water and sending water into neighboring rooms.

During a community forum a few days after the incident, Scott Armstrong, the district’s maintenance manager, said the school’s 45-year-old boiler had corroding and failing coils.

Owens said school officials will get together in the next few weeks once all votes have been counted.

“We’re going to have to figure out what options are on the table,” Owens said. “If we want to take advantage of some state funding, we will have to run another bond. … There’s a lot that needs to be done, so we’ll just have to take a look and see how we want to proceed.”