Guest Commentary: Voters have spoken on school levy

Mark B.
Two Harbors, MN     03/15/2010 10:17 PM

gary o....You have chosen an honorable profession. May you make a major difference in the lives of the people you serve.

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gary o.
Saint Paul, MN     03/15/2010 12:56 PM

Mr Broin, I can see you are one intelligent individual, but I have to admit I do get a headache trying to read and figure out most of your comments with all your numbers and statistics. You don't need to fill me in on the "struggling poor and disabled," I work in social services, I see them everyday.

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Mark B.
Two Harbors, MN     03/15/2010 12:25 PM

gary o....Yes, I am concerned about the taxes on my "valuable lake property", but more concerned that those taxes will be appropriately used for the general well being of every citizen in Lake County. And , why would my lake property be any more intrinsically "valuable" than any one else's property in the county is to them? The value of property owned by any of us has less to do with its physical location than how we view it as a place we live, care for and are proud of. And, the value of the services each of us enjoys from our government and our school system should have little or nothing to do nothing to do with the physical location where each of us lives. In fact, locations on the lake for fire and police services are probably a lot less demanding to get to than a lot of outlying properties. So, we should really be focused on how well our money is spent and accounted for, regardless of how little or how much any of us may be required to contribute. Very few of us came through this economic crisis unscathed, and many lost everything they had. Our economy has probably changed in ways it will never return to in our life-time. It is the responsibility of everyone to respect the situations of others, particularly our seniors, those who are suffering from disabilities, cannot help themselves, and the poor and struggling amongst us. It is also the responsibility of our elected officials, and those who work for us, to be prudent with their resources, be accountable to the citizens they represent, and be open, honest and understandable about about what drives their needs. And, like all the rest of us, if we can't afford to give them more money they have to figure out a way to "live" within realistic means. There is no public function which can justify the gradual decimation of the lives of its citizens in pursuit of its own interests. That is as simple as it gets to me. It doesn't depend on where you live, whether you are rich or poor, or whether you have the resources to "afford" it. What we are talking about is respect for the value of everyone's life, and the struggles each person endures to maintain any semblance of "quality" in living their lives. And, like it or not, that means respecting that portion of a person's life they trade for money to live by. The school system is not exempt from showing that respect to its citizens by clearly justifying its claims, and demonstrating it has no other reasonable options. No one is against providing a quality education for our kids, but why would we treat the school system any differently than any other situation when it comes to accountability and fair play?

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gary o.
Saint Paul, MN     03/15/2010 9:06 AM

I am fully aware of the economic conditions in Lake County. I have family and friends there and am in TH regularly. I understand that comparing taxes from one county to another is like apples and oranges. I simply pointed out the huge discrepency in the amounts paid. Unlike Mr. Broin, I didn't advocate voting for or against it, that isn't my concern or business. I am also skeptical that Mr. Broin is that concerned about the people on fixed incomes. My guess is he is more concerned about the taxes he will be paying of the valuable lake property he owns, which is totally within his right.

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Mark B.
Two Harbors, MN     03/15/2010 1:42 AM

Kevin...I believe Brian G. and gary o. may be missing the point, based upon their comments. gary o.'s taxes cannot be compared to yours except from the perspective of the line item charges going to each taxing authority in Dakota County from his total property tax bill. The line item charges in your bill will relate differently to his, depending upon what each county, city, school district and other recipients of property tax monies are doing with their taxing authority projects. Some counties and cities assess residents for street repairs in front of their homes; some homes have sewer and water assessments not yet paid off by the homeowner; some are assessing for major county or city projects. To compare fairly, a lot of information on both counties' levy budgets has to be known. Besides, in a county like Dakota, with 393,000 people, the cost of providing services is going to be substantially higher than Lake County with only around 11, 000 people. In terms of property tax relative to market value, Dakota falls in the middle of the range for Minnesota counties and Lake is slightly lower. Lake County has 21% of its citizens over age 65; Dakota has 8.6%. Lake County has 15.5% of its population disabled; Dakota 10.6%. Lake County has a 9.7% poverty rate; Dakota's poverty rate is 4.6%. The median household income in Lake County is $49,700; Dakota is $71,100; the state is $57,300. These two counties hardly compare. Now, the real issue we have been talking about is the school portion of your property taxes in Lake County, which with no referendum will go up over 25% this year (they went up a comparably large amount last year). The fundamental aspect of the proposed referendum questions, is whether or not the nearly $10,400 per student (as high as some of the best districts in the state) in STATE and other NON-PROPERTY tax revenue the school district is getting, in addition to the school property taxes you are paying, really isn't enough to properly educate kids in the district. I can't seem to be able to get a straight answer from the district supporting their claims that additional financial monies are needed, and other options for addressing the school district's budget issues won't work. So, naturally, I have a concern. Now, new high school or not, last year this district's compensation costs were 88% of their expenditures (compared to around 78% average for all districts in the state). Some of this was "unfunded/unreserved" OPEB (essentially retiree medical benefits) charges, including interest, which is being levied against you on your tax bill. These OPEB charges came about from the district's failure to establish adequate cash reserves, over past years, to meet the district's anticipated future medical obligations to its retirees. Not all districts in the state had allowed this sort of problem to arise, but our district did. Paying off a nearly $8 million 2008 district bond issue to mitigate this accounting issue will cause a rise in your school property taxes for many years to come. You had no say in this issue, because changes in state law allowed the district to levy this $8 million without a referendum. The district's current levels of student funding increased by 6.55% from 2008 to 2009...contradicting the superintendent's claim the poor "economy" has contributed to the district's funding problems. In 2007 to 2008, the district's per student funding was barely impacted by a drop around 3/4 of 1% of its student funding total. Prior to 2008, the non-property tax funding increased by between around 5.5% and nearly 8% per year...nearly 20% in total from 2005 to 2009! The district's real funding issues (aside from their big OPEB liability) come from a steady drop in enrollment, costing the district more than $6 million in today's funding dollars since about 1998, combined with an out-of-district student loss of over 400 kids attending school elsewhere last year, costing the district over $4 million in funding. So, yes, the new school has proven to be grossly overbuilt based upon the initial student populations prior to building...but I believe the proponents of the larger "type" and "scope" of the new school were adequately forewarned about this trend by those in favor of a more "scaled down" building effort. Whatever the case, a major challenge now facing the district is to address declining enrollment and find other ways of using the new school to generate revenue. How they do this with existing resources, staff, benefit programs, the union and the community is clearly not going to be easy. It is clear to me, however, simply passing on a challenging management issue to the public by raising taxes is not appropriate, unless the district can present a really good financial justification and show there are no other options. Not only have they not done this for the public, they are resisting providing any reasoning to support their case beyond the standard "sound bites", and time-worn threats regarding a decline in education quality for the kids. My response, and yours, has been appropriately and simply "show us the logic". And beyond that, respectfully consider the financial problems and resources of the community, and if at all possible figure out a way to do the job without additional funds. Lake County government was able to hold its levy dollars the same as last year, facing all kinds of challenging issues, respecting the economic circumstances of its citizens, and providing some very nice public financial detail...and I thank them for their effort. I expect no less of our school district, particularly during these difficult economic times for everyone.

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Kevin D.
03/14/2010 10:40 PM

Those of you who don't live here, you look up what we pay in taxes, you compare us to you, and yet, you don't really understand the economy up here at all, so, I write notes like the one the paper printed for all of us, who DO live here. True, the new school is beautiful, and the energy savings have been written about many times, but the reason it was built was haywire and not many can deny the campaign centered on "if you build it, they will come, mentality. I live here. I look around, and there are precious few new jobs, if any. Seems like the best replies are from people who live, who know. I appreciate those comments. From down south, there is a big difference between complainers and those who simply remind of us of what we already know. I love it up here, and wouldn't trade any of it for anywhere else, no matter what it costs. Not all of us here can afford the levy, plain and simple, and probably, most cannot. Even simpler. Have a nice day, everyone.

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Brien G.
Two Harbors, MN     03/14/2010 6:59 PM

Gary O. Touche.

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gary o.
Saint Paul, MN     03/14/2010 2:05 PM

As someone who grew up in Two Harbors and owns property in Lake County I find it hard to understand how some people can complain about the amount they pay in property taxes. I looked up what Mr. Downey pays in property taxes and even though the property we own here in Dakota County is not quite double Mr. Downey's taxable value, our taxes are 5 x's the amount he pays. I am not complaining about what I pay, but just trying to give some proper perspective on how things are in other parts of the state that don't rely on government aid. www.parcelinfo.com is a good resource to see property value amounts and what the taxes are. For all of you folks that fought for the new school and those who serve on the school board and Lake County board, I admire your willingness to serve and dedication to try and make things better in spite of some of the constant and chronic complainers.

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Rueben H.
03/12/2010 10:39 AM

I think you all should read Mark B.'s comments on the article "District targets critics’ voices" on the "Home" tab. Why aren't we getting information from the school district like this to explain their financial problems to us? Why isn't the Superintendent talking to attendees at these public meetings as directly and factually as this?

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jon m.
03/11/2010 3:10 PM

Kevin, You should run for School Board! Sane people like yourself could bring sanity to the Insane!

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