The Sequim School District’s fourth attempt at a school construction bond in the past two years didn’t make the mark.
Results from the special election show that the $54 million proposal is garnering 8,068 yes votes (57.31 percent) of the 14,077 ballots tallied by the Clallam County Auditor’s Office as of Feb. 12.
The bond proposal requires a 60 percent “super majority” to earn approval.
“I don’t know what to say,” Sequim School District superintendent Gary Neal said after hearing last week’s initial ballot count. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I think this is a very scary statement by the community,” Neal said. “This is bigger than a bond — there’s something else out there.”
The measure would have among other things paid for a new elementary school, added general education classrooms at Greywolf Elementary School, science classrooms at Sequim High School, new choir and band rooms at Sequim High and a major remodel of the school district’s kitchen that services each of the schools.
“These kids need a different opportunity; there’s no argument to that,” Neal said. “This isn’t about us or a lack of effort and it’s not about what’s right,” he said. “There is something else going on out there.”
Proponents of the bond said the new construction and remodeling was necessary, particularly to help crowding at Helen Haller Elementary School that was built in 1967.
Among other things, opponents of the proposal were concerned with a number of issues regarding the proposal, from the total amount of taxes raised to the interest that would have to be paid over 20 years, running between $30-$40 million.
In the November 2015 General Election, a $49.3 bond proposal with a similar project list fell short of the 60 percent mark by less than one-half of 1 percent. A February 2015 bond proposal garnered 57.6 percent of the vote.
A $154 million construction bond garnered only about 47 percent yes votes in April 2014.
Neal and bond supporters gathered on election night, reflecting on the district’s fourth attempt at garnering support for new school facilities.
“A ZIP code shouldn’t determine your level of education and that’s what these kids are suffering from,” Neal said.
“I cannot believe this,” he told bond supporters. “I am shocked and I am sorry.”
“Part of the problem is my job is to make sure that kids get the education that they need to succeed and this (failure to pass a construction bond) becomes problematic because it begins to take us away from our real mission.”
Dave Mattingley, former bond campaign chairman, offered his support for Neal and future bond proposals Tuesday night.
“We have an excellent superintendent here, we have an excellent staff and it may not be today, but we will have a bond and we will build a school,” he said. “Education is very important for this community — it’s the growth that will drive this community.”
“I feel like it’s so unfair,” Sequim High School senior Emma Eekhoff said regarding the bond’s failure. “Emily (Webb, also an SHS senior) and I have the opportunity to leave and are going to universities, but for the kids in elementary school, they don’t have a choice.”
“This is just going to bring younger and upcoming students down,” Eekhoff said.
“If they don’t feel like a community cares about them, then what do they have?” Webb said.
“I am disappointed,” Sequim School District Board president Bev Horan said, “but hold onto hope that our community will create some form of construction bond.”
Next steps
Neal spent time last week talking with school staff members at their campuses regarding the election results. He said he thanked them for their efforts not only in the recent bond proposal but for their daily work teaching students.
A message Neal had for them is that administrators would be looking over data and considering their next step.
“We’re going to continue to collect data,” Neal said. “I think at this point we’re going to slow down, catch our breath (and) develop a well-informed comprehensive plan.”
“The analogy is (shaking out) the old Etch-a-Sketch,” Neal said. “We’re getting input, good information. We will have a plan and we will be methodical about it.”
“I am disappointed that community didn’t pass the bond,” school board director Mike Howe said. “Obviously I believe this is something we need and the problems aren’t going away.”
Howe said much of what will happen next will depend on the leadership of the board and recommendations from administrators.
“It’s my hope that we have discussions within upcoming board meetings about what the future of education looks like in Sequim and explore all sorts of options,” he said.
James Stoffer, Sequim School District Board of Directors legislative representative, said that until district officials are able to analyze the Feb. 9 election results, it would be all “speculations” at this point to try to identify why the bond proposal wasn’t able to reach that super majority.
Stoffer noted, however, that, “I think there’s some dissatisfaction with national politics and policies and here’s where people can respond or feel like they can do something.”
Colleen Robinson, Citizens for Sequim Schools president, said her group — the grassroots organization promoting local school bonds and levies — will wait for the school district to set the course for a possible fifth bond campaign or something else entirely.
“We’re going to let the dust settle and re-group a little bit and catch our breath,” she said. “The problems aren’t going to go away and that’s something the opposition doesn’t seem to be getting.”
“This doesn’t mean the problems are going to go away, or the Citizens for Sequim Schools,” Robinson said. “We’ll keep moving forward and we’ll keep asking.”
Taking it to Olympia
As the board’s legislative representative, Stoffer and a handful of local representatives are planning to visit Olympia on Feb. 19 to attend a public hearing in the House Committee on Education on House Bill 1941.
The bill allows the authorization of school district bonds at general elections by a simple majority — 50 percent plus one vote — instead of requiring the super majority.
Because of the short session, “it won’t make it into law this year,” Stoffer said. Still, he said, “it gives some hope.”
Basically levies support learning in school districts, Stoffer said, while bonds support construction.
Levies require a simple majority to pass while bonds require the higher 60 percent standard.
In 2013, what was known as an “M&O” or Maintenance and Operations levy was changed to “EP&O” for Education, Programs and Operations. The “M” of Maintenance and Operations often was assumed as infrastructure maintenance, but it actually represented maintenance of educational programs, Stoffer explained.
The last EP&O levy was renewed in 2013, but expires in 2018 and thus will need renewed, Stoffer said.
Campaign drive perspective
Robinson said she saw several positives from the most recent campaign, despite the bond falling short.
“From my prospective, because I am kind of a ‘sunny side up girl’ there are a lot of successes here while we didn’t met that super majority,” Robinson said. “The involvement from the Sequim High School students was a huge, wonderful gain.”
Stoffer concurred.
“I was encouraged and very proud of our kids,” Stoffer said. “They did their civic duty and got engaged with the democratic process — It’s a wonderful thing to see.”
“We have many successes to celebrate and the number one is more than the majority in our community want this,” Robinson said. “It isn’t like it’s a win for the ‘noes’ — it’s just that we didn’t meet the super majority.”
“(Also), the tours that the school did were amazing and I am hoping the school will continue to do a tour once a month,” Robinson said. “Some great conversation and ideas started and were shared at those tours.”
There are other things the citizens group learned, she said, that could prove useful for another school construction proposal in the future.
“We plan to talk with the many other communities where school districts like Port Townsend and Crescent, did pass proposals and see what they did,” Robinson said. “We’ll certainly be reviewing the last campaign and identify what things worked and what didn’t.”
One of the approaches that didn’t work well for the campaign, she said, was, “having to answer to the opposition that didn’t have the facts correct.”
“It’s unfortunate that we had to take time and energy and clarify facts even to supporters,” she said.
Robinson added that she’d like to see her group be more visible in the community and not just “pop up when there’s a bond or a levy.”
How school bonds fared in the region, state
February special election results show 17 of 28 school construction bonds across Washington state are gaining at least 60 percent (“super majority”) needed for approval, including those Port Townsend, Bainbridge Island and Central Kitsap, but proposals are failing in Chimacum and South Kitsap.
By a wide margin (73.2 percent), voters are approving a $40.9 million bond in Port Townsend that will pay for a new elementary school and add security and ADA compliance improvements at Port Townsend High School. It will return fourth- and fifth-grade students currently taught at Blue Heron Middle School back to what district officials call “a more age-appropriate elementary school setting.”
To be paid over 20 years, the Port Townsend bond increases taxes for property owners by 70 cents per $1,000 of assessed value, starting in 2017.
The Chimacum School District’s $29 million bond proposal is garnering about 58 percent of votes. Its approval would have renovated, constructed and expanded a preschool-second grade Chimacum Primary School to add classrooms through fifth grade, demolished all or a portion of the existing 1948 Chimacum 3-5 grade school, made security improvements districtwide, renovated/modernized the Chimacum School District’s main campus, upgraded district technology and more.
A school construction measure at Central Kitsap passed by a slim margin (60.8 percent) and failed at South Kitsap (59.8 percent).
