With school district bond and levy elections coming up on Feb. 12, La Center School District Superintendent Dave Holmes is wondering how voters will react.
“This is the first go-around after all the chaos,” he said.
Holmes is referring to this past summer, when an influx of state money for education led to every school district in the state bargaining for new teacher contracts. In Washington, 15 teachers unions went on strike, nearly half of them in Clark County.
La Center teachers didn’t strike. The district pretty much stayed out of the fracas altogether, with the district and teachers union declining to speak publicly for much of the summer.
“We could’ve gotten our members to strike, but for what?” Kathy Bounds, president of the La Center Education Association, said in November. “What was on the table was what was on the table. There’s no way everybody was going to be thrilled.”
La Center teachers signed a contract that gave them a 7.8 percent increase in total salary compensation with an average salary of $72,300.
“I think we came out of McCleary looking like we were responsible, respectful and like we did the right thing,” Holmes said.
The district will really start feeling the impacts of the new education funding model this year, as its running a replacement three-year educational programs and operations levy on the ballot in a special election on Feb. 12. As part of the McCleary decision, which pumped $7.3 billion of state money into education followed by another $1 billion for teacher salaries in 2018, there is a cap on how much districts can ask for in local levy dollars.
Local levies can only go up to $1.50 per $1,000 of assessed property value, which is what La Center is asking residents to vote for. Before the McCleary decision, La Center expected to have a levy rate of $2.86 per $1,000 of assessed value for 2019. The rate in 2018 was $2.58 per $1,000 of assessed value.
With the levy cap, the district anticipates collecting $1,917,514 in levy dollars for the 2019-2020 school year.
Holmes said the district’s financial outlook is OK for now. With increased teacher salaries, Vancouver Public School officials are looking at potential staff reductions to deal with an estimated $11.4 million deficit.
“It’s looking like we can break even and be just right,” Holmes said. “In our bargaining this spring, we wanted to get a deal done without have to make any serious cuts.”
He did say that current projects call for a “small shortfall” at the end of the upcoming four years, although Holmes said a lot can change between now and then.
Holmes and La Center officials have been vocal about some issues the district has with the McCleary decision. Sen. Ann Rivers, R-La Center, attended a school board meeting in November to talk to the board and district officials about their concerns.
La Center is in a unique position. The state sent a set amount per teacher to each school district, and nearly half of La Center’s 100 teachers have been with the district for 15 or more years. The district’s salary schedule puts 31.5 positions in the highest-paying grid on the schedule, the most of any grid.
“Our money doesn’t stretch as far because of our experienced staff,” Holmes said.
However, if the state passes a levy lid lift, that doesn’t help much either.
“We’re a property poor district,” Holmes said. “In a bigger district, they can raise a lot of money with 15 more cents. Raising the levy lid is inequitable if you’re a property poor district.”
Still, the district has to plan for and manage growth. La Center has 1,722 students at last count. That number is expected to jump to 2,200 in the next three-plus years, and around 3,000 in a little more than eight years, according to Holmes. In 2018, voters passed a $48 million bond so the district can build a new 81,375-square-foot middle school, which would open in time for the start of the 2020-2021 school year. A little more than $1 million of the bond money will go toward renovating the K-8 building into an elementary school.
Melinda Mazna, chairwoman for Citizens for La Center Schools, said the public has been receptive to the district’s needs and what the levy money will be used for.
“People have been pretty supportive,” she said. “They get it once it’s explained. The district has a reputation for spending their money well.”
Holmes said he’s hopeful the new middle school will go to bid between April and mid-summer, and break ground this year.
If the three-year levy passes, it will be used to pay for extra curricular activities, technology, food service, transportation, maintenance, career and technical education and music.
“Without levies, all of this stuff goes away,” he said. “No district without levies can be the kind of district a community wants.”
