Owen-Withee School District's Referendum, Part 1
Wednesday, March 26th, 2014 -- 1:14 PM
-The Owen-Withee School District will ask their residents to approve a $300,000 referendum when they cast their votes on April 1st.During a public meeting on Tuesday, Owen-Withee District Administrator Bob Houts informed those present that the district has lost nearly $1 million in state aid since the 2010-2011 school year. According to facts provided by the district, the revenue limit for Owen-Withee during the 2010-2011 school year was $5,847,729. This year, the district has a revenue limit of $4,843,941.
?We?ve been running a $200,000 deficit the past two years,? said Mr. Houts. ?We just can?t do that anymore. We need to have a savings floor and we?ve just about reached the floor.?
The referendum will have two parts. The first will ask residents to continue the $150,000 referendum that was passed back in 2004 and expires in June of 2014. The second part will ask the residents to approve another $150,000 override to meet expenses.
If the referendum isn?t passed, the Owen-Withee School District will need to cut out $300,000 from a budget that has already been severely cut. ?The first thing to go would be all athletics,? said Mr. Houts. ?Football, volleyball, basketball, track. And even if we did cut all of them, that still would only equal out to $125,000-$150,000. Then we would start cutting out classes like ag, tech ed, art, music. If that happens, students will start to leave the district and go to neighboring schools that do offer those courses and it just spirals from there.?
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