Cleveland Schools Desperately Needs $12.2M Bond, Superintendent Says

With cuts to state funding, school districts have to find ways to make ends meet. Getting help for capital improvements is out of the question for many smaller public schools, like Cleveland, which is in desperate need of upgrades.

Voters went to the polls and passed a $12.2 million bond proposal Tuesday to go toward school improvements. Proposition 1 was an $11.7 million construction bond that passed with 75 percent. Proposition 2 was a $485,000 transportation bond that passed with 77 percent.

Superintendent Aaron Espolt said the items on the proposal are not luxury items, but necessities that simply can't wait any longer.

“We were very careful about selecting items to be placed on this bond issue, to ensure they're things we just have to have,” Espolt said.

On a typical rainy day in some classrooms, ceilings and walls look more like waterfalls. The damage left behind is not hard to find - the ceiling tiles are stained, some are gone altogether. Trash cans and buckets are now permanent fixtures in some classrooms, and so are concrete floors.

“As much as we tried to condition the floors and take care of the carpets, it got to the point where we had to rip out the carpet completely,” the superintendent said.

“The kids deserve a better learning environment than this,” teacher and basketball coach Kayla Allen said.

Allen has been teaching sixth-grade science and coaching girls’ high school basketball at Cleveland for eight years. She said she’s watched her classroom slowly fall apart. She also said the deteriorating classrooms and leaky roofs are a distraction to students.

“If it's raining at all, we'll have five, six trash cans that line the far wall. And if rains very hard, my students have to move because of the splash,” Allen said. “It's not a comfortable environment. It's not a "safe environment for the students, and we just need to get things right for our kids.”

The middle school opened in 1990. The superintendent said the roof and heat and air units are original to the building.

“We've tarred it. We've fixed it. We've patched it and every time you do something, it just moves. It's time for a new roof,” Espolt said.

The repairs at the middle school top $1.4 million, but the needs are far greater than that. Espolt said the district needs $12.2 million for school improvements, like upgrading school security, adding more classrooms and building a running track that meets standards for hosting meets. That’s just to name a few items on the proposal list.

“When we look around our district, there's no option. With the state funding the way that it is and education the way that it is, there's just no money available to do capital improvements without a bond issue,” he said.

Espolt said Cleveland will lose $66,000 in state funding this year, so some of the bond money would even go toward even buying textbooks.

“I would love to not have to put textbooks on a bond issue, however, we just can't afford to be able to purchase the basic curriculum we offer our students,” he said.

If the bond doesn't pass, the district will still have to make the improvements. It would also have to make some tough decisions regarding jobs and salaries.

“The only funding that's available is salaries, and position and school personnel, and again, what's best for the kids and that's what we have to weigh,” Espolt said.

The superintendent and every administrative official in the district are doing what they can - leading by example and giving up their raises, money that will go back to the students.

“We need to protect as many jobs as we possibly can, so if that means that I, as a superintendent, can model that and give up some of that funding to put back into my school district, then absolutely, I'll do it every time,” Espolt said. “It's not our salaries, it's about those kids and how can we help those kids.”

The bond would be paid for through a ten percent tax increase that would last ten years. The superintendent said that comes out to about $4.67 for the average property in town, which is about $85,000 dollars.

You can learn more about the proposal here.