School districts look to voters as rising costs strain budgets

It s an unusual year for school referenda. That s what one political analyst told 5 Eyewitness News as we dug through the tax questions schools are asking you to approve this year. “This is an unusual year because there are just more requests by school boards for increased school property taxes,” said Larry Jacobs, a political analyst with the Hubert H. Humphrey School of Public Affairs at the University of Minnesota. Sixty-three different school districts across Minnesota have put 83 requests on the November ballot. More than half of those, 55%, are districts asking you to increase their operating levy, money above what the state sends per student that districts can use to pay teachers, buy pens and pencils, and just keep the lights on. “Without that, many of them are reporting that they re looking at a financial crisis,” said Jacobs. The majority of schools asking for more money to keep the doors open say they re trying to make up for budget shortfalls, which can come