School board approves $20 million proposal, but concerns remain
Published Wednesday, March 19, 2008
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Stumble It!The Fairbanks North Star Borough School District voted to submit a bond proposal for the October election ballot, but the request will face challenges from the Fairbanks North Star Borough Assembly.
The board’s $19.9 million bond request is mainly for building maintenance in the district and was originally $30 million before being trimmed down to cover what the board considered necessities.
Nadine Winters, the assembly’s presiding officer, said a tax cap initiative that will be on the ballot will be very problematic for the school board’s bond proposal and education funding in general in the future. The tax cap will set a legal limit on the level of taxes collected each year.
The cap was one of the concerns the borough’s chief of staff, Bob Shefchik, brought to the board at a work session Feb. 5. Shefchik’s other concern was the rising energy costs. The combination of the factors, Shefchik said, would make unfavorable political conditions for the bond proposal.
Board president Leslie Hajdukovich acknowledged the odds against the bill but said “We need to be good stewards of our facilities.”
Board member Sue Hull said the voters will support the maintenance of the buildings because preventative measures will cost the public less in the long run.
In other business, the board agreed to support participation in the Dolly Parton Imagination Library Program. The nonprofit corporation of the Dollywood Foundation provides a hardcover book every month to children under the age of 5. The program costs $30 per year per child for books and postage. Superintendent Nancy Wagner and Hull, the president of the Fairbanks Early Childhood Commission, are looking at possible fundraisers for the program, but children can be registered online at www.imaginationlibrary.com/.
“I’m so excited to see the response from the community,” Hull said.
At Tuesday’s meeting, the board also adopted revised versions of the art, health and physical education curriculums.
Community Discussion
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One day we are reading about how dysfunctional our school district is, questioning why we have such a high drop out rate, and asking, "why are so many of our children failing." The next day we are reading about this same district wanting millions of dollars more in their budget. All the beautiful, state of the art buildings in the world won't fix the mess, called our education system. All students do not learn the same, a fact educators seem to understand in the elementary grades, however, as soon as they enter the middle and high school grades they are dumped into a huge "melting pot" of sorts, left to fend for themselves, often causing much trauma to entire families. Our present education system works for a VERY SMALL percentage of our students. Our money should be invested in more appropriate teaching methods, rather than state of the art buildings and sport teams.
nmg, I have several issues with your comment. The first being that "one day" we're discussing drop outs and the "the next day" we're spending money on buildings. Both are on-going issues. The school district introduced drop out prevention specialists a couple of years ago through a grant-funded program. Working on keeping our kids in school and helping them be successful has been a long-time focus of the district. In the fall (not yesterday) a flawed study brought unjustified attention to some of our schools -- Ben Eielson High school has a high turn over rate because a high percentage of the students are the children of military families. When the military moves a family every 3 years, of course many students who start their freshman year at one school are going to graduate from another school. Maybe we should ask the military to not move families so often so that their kids will make our schools look better in one flawed study?
As for the current bond issue, the district didn't just sit down last night and say "Let's ask for $20 million!" They have done their research as to what is needed and how much it will cost. It has weighed which projects are more pressing and needed than others. They have trimmed millions from the bond proposal. Obviously some thought has gone into this process.
The current request is a bond request. It's not money from the state or borough for education. It's borrowed money used to build and upkeep buildings. This money cannot be used to hire more teachers or provide more training to teachers. Many of the buildings in our district are quite old. Routine maintenance must be done. I don't want my children shivering in a cold classroom or walking around buckets catching leaks from an old roof. If the building is falling apart, it doesn't really matter what's going on inside because the environment will be too distracting and learning will be difficult.
Bonds go up for public vote. If you don't think our kids deserve safe, sound schools, vote against it. I will be supporting the school district in their pursuit of keeping our kids safe.
inchworm,
Where does the money for the bonds come from?
The people.
Who is the "borough"?
The people.
They're not "borrowing" the money, they're taking it from the taxpayers.
I have no problem paying the upkeep on our schools. I think what sticks in the mind of most taxpayers, me included, is that the education establishment keeps coming to the taxpayers for more and more in the form of bonds. For those on a fixed income, the burden gets heavier and heavier, especially with rising food and fuel prices. If I have to choose between my kids being warm and fed in their own home or "shivering in a cold classroom or walking around buckets catching leaks from an old roof", I'll give them a warmer sweater to wear to school and teach them how to avoid objects on the floor when they walk. Your argument about distractions is the same type of argument the school district has used to push bond issues down our throats in the past. Resurfacing the track at Lathrop is a perfect example.
Actually, school bonds are a debt. The school district borrows money to complete the repairs to schools. The state then reimburses 70% of the debt. We all know that while there are not state sales or income taxes, citizens do pay other fees and taxes in Alaska, but we also know that there's always talk about where most of the state's revenue comes from -- oil. So ultimately, the school district is looking for a way outside of normal taxes to pay for these improvements to schools.
And if you read the article, it mentions there is also a tax cap being discussed, which would be problematic not only for the bonds, but also for "education funding in general in the future." Local property taxes would go to help pay the 30% of the debt, but they also go towards general education expenses.
I don't know...the same people who don't like maintenance bonds hate new building bonds even more, but if you don't maintain the buildings, you will need new (more expensive) ones even sooner. That doesn't make any sense to me at all.
Didn't say they weren't a debt. The taxpayers pay back the other 30%, assuming the state covers the 70%. I don't know if the money is borrowed from a financial institution to finance a project up front, or if the bonds are used directly to finance the project, I'm not an expert on the issuance of bonds.
I didn't say I didn't like maintenance bonds. What I was trying to get across was that a lot of the taxpayers are tired of the school district, and the borough for that matter, coming around with their hands out for more and more money. Maybe if they were a little bit more careful about what they asked for, people wouldn't be so reluctant to consider the projects they're asking for. Resurfacing the track at Lathrop was one example. The dog park is another. Although no bonds were ever issued for that project, the borough did end up spending, if I recall correctly, close to half a million dollars of taxpayer money. In my opinion, the voters sent a clear message to the assembly not to spend any money on it by defeating the bond measure, but the assembly took it upon themselves to spend close to $500,000 on it anyway. The rebuild of Nordale and the other school (whose name I can't recall) is another good example. How many times did the voters say no, before they finally succeeded in cramming it down our throats. I think situations like this lead to distrust of our elected officials.
I'm well aware of the tax cap, I vote for it every time its on the ballot. And, I did read the article, so don't be so condescending. I have to live with in my means. Its time for the borough and the school district to realize they can't have it all and live within their means too. Especially when there are ways they can save money.
Sales Tax People. it really does work
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