The Oakwood board of education took an initial step to seek 5.75 mills of property tax for operations and 1 mill for permanent improvements, according to the district. The board’s 5-0 vote Tuesday night will allow the auditor’s office to certify the millage before the school board’s formal vote July 10 to place the issue on the November ballot, officials said.
The district said voter passage of the proposal, Oakwood schools’ first “new money request” in four years, will involve “additional investment” by taxpayers and generate more than $2.47 million annually in total.
School board President John Wilson said district officials have been talking in work sessions for months about the combined levy.
“This takes a long time to roll out and make sure we’ve covered all the bases. … It’s certainly in alignment with our previous levies,” he said.
The operating part of the levy would generate $2.1 million annually, according to the district, to pay for staffing, instructional materials and student programming costs.
The other 1 mill would generate $373,000 annually, according to the district and would be used for facility improvements and maintenance, technology and security, officials said.
Interim Superintendent Allyson Couch cited Oakwood’s aging school buildings — some of which are about 100 years old — in the need for the levy.
“I think the combination of the operating and the permanent improvement (is) an important one,” Couch said.
Oakwood voters this past November agreed to extend an existing 1.8-mill permanent improvement levy for another five years. It is expected to raise about $534,000 in the first year, officials said. Voters in the school district have approved that levy each time it has been on the ballot since the late 1970s, district officials said.
In 2019, Oakwood voters approved an additional school tax issue that was a combination levy/bond to raise money for $18 million in renovations to the district’s schools, as well as pay for day-to-day operating costs.
One piece was a permanent 4.99-mill levy to pay for higher personnel and operating expenses, costing an extra $174.65 annually for a $100,000 home. The second part was a 37-year, 2.71-mill bond for the renovations, costing $94.85. That made the total cost of the 2019 levy $269.50 per $100,000 of property value.
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