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It’s a trick every teen-ager knows. When you don’t get the answer you want, wait a little while and rephrase the question.
After three years, the Freeman School District figures it’s waited long enough.
Ballots will be mailed this week to voters in Freeman area, asking them to approve a general obligation bond sale of $19.5 million to be paid back by property owners over 20 years. If approved, the money will be used to renovate and modernize the elementary and high schools, and make other necessary capital improvements.
If that sounds somewhat familiar, it should. The district last posed a similar question – that time for $11.7 million – in May 2005. Voters split their votes 50-50. In 2002, the bond request failed twice – the second time by only 26 votes.
Instead of coming back to voters for a fourth time the following year, the district’s board of directors opted to take their time, conduct some surveys, hold some community meetings and make sure no one could say they didn’t understand what was at stake.
“We really want voters to understand what the needs are,” Superintendent Sergio Hernandez, who was hired in the summer of 2006, said. “There’s a lot of information out there, and we’re happy to make sure they get it.”
In a nutshell, the southeast Spokane County’s biggest problem is time itself. Freeman High School, built in 1957 to house 150 students, now holds twice that number. Its safety and emergency systems are antiquated, the heating and cooling systems are old and inefficient, hallways are crowded during breaks, doorways that should be locked for safety’s sake must remain open so students can access the school’s four necessary portable classrooms, and the roof leaks.
The situation isn’t much better at the Freeman Elementary School, which sits just up the road from the high school. Opened in 1970 to handle 300 kindergartners to eighth-graders, the FES now serves 350 students in grades K-5. Sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders are at Freeman Middle School, built in 1989. The school has pretty much the same problems as the high school, with the added issue of the gym doubling as the cafeteria and performance hall.
With about $17.2 million earmarked for the high school improvements, another $9.8 at the elementary and about another $3 million for general campus modernization, the total project cost is about $30 million. The state will fund about $10.5 million, leaving the bond request to cover the remaining $19.5 million.
“We’ve decided it would make more sense to aggressively renovate the existing facilities rather than go forward with new construction,” Hernandez said. “It will keep the cost down.”
Residents in the district are currently paying about 91 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value on the middle school bond, which will expire in December 2008. The new bond would not exceed $2.50 per $1,000. So, subtracting the old bond amount, district patrons would see an increase of $1.59 per $1,000, supporters say. That means a home with an assessed value of $200,000 would see a monthly tax increase of $26.50 beginning in 2009.
“There’s no good time to ask taxpayers for money,” said Kate Coomes, who co-chairs the election’s advocacy committee and has two grade-schoolers in the district. “But with the other bond expiring, it helps keep the cost down.”
Of course, supporters say, there is very little that’s different from the 2005 plan. Some facilities will be larger, but the difference in cost is due to the rising costs of building materials and inflation – factors that won’t go away if the bond request fails a fourth time.
“There are other differences, such as the safety issues surrounding the doors,” Coomes said. “But primarily, the difference is the rise in building costs.”
Voter approval must reach the 60-percent supermajority threshold to pass.
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By
Mike Huffman
