By Adam Krebs

editor@themonroetimes.com

MONROE — The School District of Monroe Board of Education asked its administration to contact and work with legal council to draft a question for approval by the board for its next meeting in August in order to place an operational referendum on the November ballot. Whether that operational referendum question will include language making the financial burden recurring (continuous year after year) or nonrecurring (limited number of years) has yet to be decided.

What wasn’t in dispute was how much the board would ask for — the clear consensus was to ask taxpayers for $1.5 million per year. That’s the same amount the district had been collecting from a nonrecurring referendum passed in 2016 and extended in 2018 — though that referendum came to an end on June 30. 

District Superintendent Rodney Figueroa said that with eight years of having the $1.5 million on the books, taxpayers are used to it, and the district budget is easier to balance.

“The $1.5 million has been in the budget for eight years and it is essentially a built-in part of the budget” at this point, he said. 

Figueroa said the recommendation by administration is to go with the $1.5 million recurring referendum option.

“The $1.5 million that we have had in place for the past eight years … it ends up being about an $84 cost per $100,000 of equalized valuation within the district,” Business Administrator Ron Olson said. “And keep in mind that the average home is now $200-300,000, so you’re going to have to take that number and times by two or three.”

Without that extra $1.5 million, the district now faces a deficit of more than $2.5 million, much of which is due to a series of shortfalls of funding from the state government over the past 15 years.

With seven of the nine board members in attendance at the regular school board meeting July 22, a discussion on the pros and cons of each type were had. The board seemingly was split between asking for a recurring $1.5 million and asking for a four-year plan. 

Jim Curran said that while he would be a supportive ‘yes’ vote either way, he’s unsure if asking taxpayers to permanently chip in extra money year after year would pass. Rising home values, fluctuations in equalized tax burdens and other local tax-based referendums over the past few years have affected every district resident in some form or another. 

“What can we get passed? Thinking about our current political context right now — anything that makes it less likely to pass, I think we should steer away from,” Curran said. “The data says it’s pretty close, but my instinct is telling me a recurring referendum in this environment is a harder sell than even what the data suggests.”

Terri Montgomery and treasurer Phil Vosberg joined Curran in being wary of going the route of asking the public about a recurring referendum — something School District of Monroe taxpayers haven’t passed in over 25 years.

“My concern since our last meeting, too, is the fact that recurring don’t pass at the same rate as nonrecurring,” Montgomery said. “If you’re in our political climate, is nonrecurring the best way to go?”

Board president Rich Deprez, clerk Nikki Austin, deputy clerk Dylan McGuire and Eric Eckdhal sat in the recurring camp. Vice president Teresa Keehn missed the majority of the discussion, arriving to the meeting late due to a scheduling conflict, and Mike Froseth was absent.

“I think it’s critically important that we get this passed,” Vosberg said. “I would like it to be recurring … but I’m a little concerned. I think we have to think about everything we can do to get this accepted and passed by our community. I’m a little concerned that if we do a recurring vs. nonrecurring that might jeopardize us a little bit.” 

In the end, the board agreed to table the decision for one more meeting, allowing Froseth and Keehn to weigh in further, all while Business Administrator Ron Olson will bring in further budget projections. 

At the start of the meeting, Olson gave three six-year projection scenarios — one a base value, one adjusted for smaller pay increases to staff, and the third adjusted for a slower enrollment decrease. Those projections were requested by the board for referendum options of $1.5 million, $2 million, and $2.5 million. The $1.5 million only allows the district to make it three or, at best, four more years before asking yet another referendum question would be required. A recurring referendum this time around would mean that second question sometime in 2027 or 2028 would be for a lower amount than a nonrecurring one, as the nonrecurring one would be coming off the books yet again.

Also at the meeting, the board received a curriculum update from Todd Paradis, Director of Curriculum. He said the district would be switching to a more user-friendly system — both for staff, students and parents — than the current Skyward setup. 

District Administrator Rodney Figueroa gave several updates on the new MHS project, including that the site work has been slowed by the wetter than normal weather, but that the project is still on schedule. The next round of bids will also be finalized in the coming weeks.