OKC Area Bond Alert! — almost $1 BILLION on Nov 8th ballot

Save this sign for the next bond election in your area – photo via Amy Hedtke in Texas

Please read this article from the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs regarding a giant tax increase proposal by the Oklahoma City School Board. Here is a brief excerpt from that article by Trent England:

“A property tax increase is on the ballot for residents of the Oklahoma City School District. The superintendent described it as “the biggest bond election in the history” of the district. A municipal bond is government debt, paid back over time by property tax payers. If passed, the owner of a $250,000 home (average in the district) will pay about $200 more every year in property taxes.

So it’s worth asking, what is in the bond package? And what does it tell us about the priorities of Oklahoma City public schools?

Technically there are two bonds, but one is “small” at just $19 million to pay for some new district vehicles. The other is massive, nearly a billion dollars, for a long list of construction projects and purchases.

Actually, the largest line item in the $936,000,000 package is a catchall—what skeptics would call a slush fund—of $230,048,000. The description there is long but vague and open-ended, basically granting future school boards the power to do whatever they like with those funds within the most basic legal limits. Without these funds, the property tax increase could have been almost 25% less than what is proposed.”

“Yet the Oklahoma City public schools are doing worse than ever. Now, District leaders want to raise property taxes on parents and other residents. Their number-one expense is a massive slush fund. Other bond funds are earmarked to non-academic uses in schools where almost no students meet basic standards for academic proficiency. Some of these bond projects will drive up future operating expenses, imposing hidden costs on future taxpayers.

The Oklahoma City School District’s announcement of the bond proposal is full of flowery language about “transformation,” “putting kids first,” and providing “a world-class education.” Yet the District is an abject failure. Nothing in its massive bond proposal is likely to change that. At best, it will distract the community, continuing a “bread and circuses” approach that feeds residents’ appetites rather than providing them promised services, like education.”

These are questions every voter should ask when faced with Bond or Tax proposals on a ballot…