Cliff Buchan
News Editor

Parameters for a Nov. 7 operating levy vote were set by the ISD 831 School Board last week, but without the backing of one board member.

On a 5-1 decision on June 29, the school board voted to move forward with a two-question ballot that would ask local taxpayers to authorize the district to raise a total of $7.9 million a year for five years. The request amounts to an increase in levy authority of $1.9 million a year over what is on the tax roles today.

The plan, however, did not meet with the approval of member Eric Langness. He was the lone holdout in the decision that saw board member David Gay vote with the majority. Both Langness and Gay were elected last November as anti-levy candidates during an election that saw a district levy request handily defeated.

Langness held firm to his desire to offer multiple questions to voters with a base question tied to a series of budget cuts designed to appease opponents of past district spending decisions. The total package of levy proposals offered by Langness was $7.5 million or $400,000 lower than the amount agreed upon last week.

Langness said it was his goal to ìoffer voters a full choice.î

If the board would agree to a plan in the shape of what he has proposed, Langness said he was confident there would not be a ìVote No Campaignî to fight the proposal.

After several work sessions and much discussion, the board concluded last week it was time to move on with or without the support of Langness.

The new plan

In shaping its plan, the board agreed to seek a base levy of $6.5 million for five years without an automatic inflationary factor. The levy would in effect replace the existing $6 million levy that has one more year on the books starting this July 1.

Without voter approval to keep the local funding, the school board will face a budget reduction effort this winter that will trim $6 million to $8 million in general fund spending. Massive teacher cuts and program reductions have been identified by the administration as ways to adjust the budget.

For a home valued at $250,000, the tax impact on the $6.5 million issue is expected to cost an additional $3 a month in school property taxes over what is on the books now.

The $6.5 million total was a compromise amount.

After listening to concerns by Gay, the board agreed to reduce its first proposal from $6.75 million that featured the automatic inflationary trigger to $6.5 million mark with no inflationary clause.

The second ballot question calls for a levy of $1.4 million a year for five years. Gay said he favored an amount closer to $1 million but agreed with the proposal. There is no inflationary clause in the second ballot question.

The board agreed that the second question would provide dollars to bolster high potential programs, offer a half-day, every-other-day kindergarten program, provide dollars to implement the full scope of the districtís strategic plan and provide additional teachers to improve the student-staff ratio.

How the $1.4 million would be used was left open for discussion.

That topic will come up for review when the board meets again in special session at 7 p.m., Tuesday, July 11. The board has scheduled the special meeting to interview five applicants for the board seat left open by Keith Dunhamís resignation this spring.

The base levy question would generate $725 in per pupil funding while the second question would bring in another $125 per pupil unit. The current levy takes in $665 in per pupil funding.

Langness stands

Langness stuck to his proposal to offer a base levy of $5 million for four years and one-time budget cuts of $1 million.

Earlier, Langness proposed eliminating the four-period day at the high school, implementing a two-mile walking area for students riding buses, using a triple bussing system, cutting the evaluation and assessment coordinator and the family support advocate, eliminating the communication coordinator and reducing assistant principals from 12-month to 11-month positions.

Langness said last week the reduction plan was not set in stone but a starting place for talks and items he gleamed from Superintendent Lynn Steenblockís list of possible budget cuts.

The first-year board member also proposed second and third ballot questions that would add $1.5 million and $1 million over the four-year term. The additional funding would protect the district from additional budget cuts and enable the district to focus on lower classroom size district wide.

By not offering voters a choice, Langness said he believed the board was opening itself to a challenge at the polls.

ìPass Joeís question and you are going to have a Vote No Committee out there,î Langness said.

That brought a response from member Joe Grafft.

ìWeíre going to have a Vote No Committee if we ask for a dollar,î Grafft said, pointing to what he has observed during his 28 years of living in the district.

Board President Bill Bresin said he understood the direction Langness was moving but added that linking cuts to a levy request would be self-defeating. ìI do appreciate what heís (Langness) trying to do,î Bresin said.

ìI donít think itís going to pass,î Langness said, adding that his initial cuts of $1 million would pale in comparison to the board task of cutting $6 million or more later on.

Board reaction

Board member Rob Rapheal said the idea of making cuts while asking for levy dollars was ìjust not workable.î Rapheal said he believed it would be more difficult to pass a $5 million base levy with cuts than the $6.5 million package.

In disagreeing with Langness, Rapheal wondered how the district could expect parents to support a proposal that would require them to drive their kids to school or have them walk if they lived within two miles of their school.

Rapheal and Grafft said the fate of the levy would come down to hard work and capturing the support of the parents of students and the general public. With July now here, the board agreed it was time to set the plan in motion and allow the time needed to carry the message to the public.

Rapheal said the two-question plan would protect the basic funding needs and give the board an opportunity to address other student achievement needs. He called the proposals affordable but yet ìtight-fistedî and not being greedy in terms of funds sought.

He described the proposals as ìthoughtful, fiscally smart and good for kids.î

The board passed three motions on 5-1. Two were for the ballot questions while the third was for the formal resolution relating to the request to increase the general education revenue of the school district.

The support came from Bresin, Grafft, Rapheal, Gay and Julie Corcoran. Langness voted no on all three questions.

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