School board strategizes referendum

There are no records of when the original Shoreline Motel sign was erected on the corner of Highway 61 and Broadway Avenue, but many of the people who watched the old sign being taken down on Thursday, March 11 were glad to see it go. While Kevin Bjork and Brad Sarri from Todd Signs of Duluth were setting up the crane to put the new sign in place, the new and old signs sat sideby side on the ground. The new sign is 120 square feet and weighs 600 pounds. The signposts were cut nearly in half—the top of the new sign is 18 feet, which is 18 feet lower than the old, so the sign no longer towers over the town.

The ISD 166 school board is gearing up for a referendum and looking for people to help it pass. On Monday, March 8, 2010, the board met for a work session to talk about how they will go about promoting it.

Who did the board want to involve in preparing for the referendum? Superintendent Beth Schwarz asked the board. Bill Huggins said he wanted to include people outside the school board. Leonard Sobanja said all of them should be involved or it will look like they don’t care. Mary Sanders said it would be good to include community members, and Superintendent Schwarz suggested involving teachers.

Theboard decided to form a committee of up to 15 members, comprised of the school board, the superintendent, the staff, community members, and representatives from the board/staff/community work groups Superintendent Schwarz formed at the beginning of the school year.

Schwarz said she would create an application form and post official notices saying they are looking for committee members. The board talked about the importance of going out into their respective districts and talking about the referendum to constituents from all ends of the county.

 

The average school referendum in Minnesota is levying over $800 per pupil unit, Schwarz said. To bring in $750 per pupil unit, homesteaded and commercial properties with taxable market values of $100,000 would pay $78 more per year on their property taxes. Properties valued at $200,000 would pay $156 per year for the levy, and properties valued at $284,740 (the averaged value of homesteaded properties and industrial/commercial properties) would pay $222.

The effect of the levy would be lessened for some homestead property owners who qualify for a refund based on income and property tax paid. Agricultural property levies would be based on the value of a house, a garage, and one acre of land. Nonhomesteaded properties, such as seasonal cabins, would not be levied.

Eric Kemp said he thought people with $200,000 properties would be willing to pay $156 a year in order to bring in $750 extra per year for each student (a total of $462,766 a year). He suggested putting two questions on the ballot: one asking for an amount that would fund “absolutely essential” things and the other asking for an amount that would fund things the district would really like.

The school board did not decide how many years the levy would be in effect or the total amount it would bring in. Thelast Cook County school referendum brought in $370 per pupil unit annually for four years ending in June 2007, a total of $1,090,187.

Superintendent Schwarz had a list of things the levy could potentially fund. It included limiting kindergarten class sizes to 18 and first grade classes to 22, departmental budget increases for instructional materials, vocational classes, College in the Schools classes, building maintenance that has been delayed, and intervention for at-risk students.

Schwarz wrote, “Thirteen to fourteen percent of our students are on Individual Education Plans [IEPs], 33% of our students qualify for free or reduced food service rates, and 20% of our population is Native American. All three sub-groups exhibit an achievement gap on the MCA-II tests. We need to address this issue from several directions, including Early Childhood Education, Expansion of Response to Intervention services [close monitoring of the effect of various interventions with students who need extra help], and student support services.

Eric Kemp said they need to think about what people would be willing to support in a referendum. Community members who responded to a survey conducted several months ago indicated that they support small class sizes for elementary students, life skills training, vocational training, college

ing 3/2 /2010 preparatory classes, and support for struggling

students.

Board chair Bill Huggins pointed out what Schwarz had written on her list of what a levy could fund: “Current research strongly indicates money spent on birth through grade 3 is the best investment, dollar for dollar, [leading to] higher achievement levels, success after school, less need for remediation in the secondary, and the list goes on.”

You have to offer a good secondary program, Mary Sanders countered, if you want to keep students.

Spending money on young students can prevent the cost of remediation later, Schwarz said, but meeting the educational needs of middle and high school students is necessary as well.

Erik Kemp suggested using a levy to fund 1) college prep classes, 2) vocational training, 3) early elementary small class sizes, 4) good middle and high school programs, something parents of charter school students would see as a benefit to their own children, and 5) building maintenance that should not be neglected. This is about maintaining what they’ve been offering, he said.

In a March 17 phone interview, Superintendent Schwarz said she and the board are trying to save money wherever possible, such as by refinancing bonds at a lower interest rate, as they work on generating money through a referendum.

Joint maintenance facility

The board, with Rod Wannebo still absent, voted a second time on whether to spend its cost share of $1,463 for an engineering firm to create an initial design and estimate related costs for a joint maintenance facility to be shared with the district by five other governmental and nonprofit entities.

Maintenance Director Mike Groth said updating the school’s current maintenance facilities might be cheaper than going in on a new joint facility. He thinks the school could probably use the joint facility if they needed something that would best be done there. His department’s biggest need is storage, he said.

A motion to pay the $1,463 failed by another 2-2 vote. The school board and superintendent would like to stay informed, however. “The impression I’ve been given,” said Schwarz, “is that we can stay in the loop.” Mike Groth and school board member Leonard Sobanja will still attend planning meetings.

New buses

With the ending of the current lease of nine buses from Hoglund Bus Company, the school board approved a new agreement that will leave the district with only eight buses but save $30,466 a year. The district will keep two of the nine buses, its 84-passenger team bus and the smaller Gunflint Trail bus. It will trade in the other seven buses for six new buses the district will own after five years.

The bus fleet has had four perfect safety inspections in a row, Groth told the board. Just before going to press Wednesday, March 17, the school board met in regular session in a room packed with students, teachers, and parents there to discuss proposed staff cuts. After listening to impassioned pleas to try to keep teachers that were exceptionally good at what they do, the board voted to make the following reductions and cuts (full story to follow in the March 27 edition of the Cook County News-Herald). Reasons were “discontinuation of position, financial limitations, and/or lack of pupils.”

In addition, the board approved nonrenewal of the contracts of three probationary teachers. Special ed teachers April Wahlstrom and Eric Frost are working under licensure waivers as they pursue appropriate licensure. Their waivers require the terminations, but the positions will be re-advertised and they can re-apply. Kerry Bilben’s part-time music teaching contract was terminated as required by the waiver, but she is expected to apply for the band director position to be vacated by Bill Tormondsen after he retires in June.
 

Losing their jobs
completely:
Ann Russ
Julie Brandt
Michael McHugh
 

Losing a percentage
of their jobs: