GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) – Between now and November, the Green Bay Area Public School District (GBAPS) needs to convince taxpayers why they should pass a $183 million referendum.
The district’s first chance to do that will be Tuesday at one of several community input presentations.
“I hope that when they look at the overall projects we’re proposing that they’ll see value in them and come with the questions tomorrow night,” says GBAPS Interim Superintendent Vicki Bayers on Monday night following the district’s school board meeting.
The $183 million will be divided into two main priorities: the first $33 million will address safety and security concerns among district schools, as well as the renovations of bathrooms at nine schools to address accessibility and ADA concerns.
The remaining $150 million will update schools that will be taking on more students after the closure of six elementary schools, as well as address some deferred maintenance in district buildings.
“We’re not bringing forward all the deferred maintenance because that would be around $500 million dollars and I don’t think any school district in the nation could pull that off, although Madison is trying,” Bayers says. “So, I think what you’ll find is a balance of what we find is higher priority deferred maintenance projects as well as how can we improve on the schools that are going to be receiving the consolidation.”
Bayers says the proposal comes as debt from the previous 10-year referendum will be paid off by fall 2026.
“For this particular referendum, our goal would be to hold the mill rate at $8.26 or, in fact, lower it. The costs of the new debt would be offset by the drop in the district’s existing debt,” she said Monday.
If feedback from the public isn’t positive, or if the referendum fails in November, the district says they’re making backup plans.
“We are going to have a board meeting coming up in August to allow the board to look at boundary changes and modifications that we would have to implement in the event that the referendum doesn’t pass. We’re still going through with the consolidation of the schools so not having a referendum pass, the consolidations will still happen but we’ll have to make some boundary adjustments so the public will be well aware of what the potential would be if the referendum were to fail.”
Today’s public information sessions will be held at the Neville Museum at 12:15 & 6:00 p.m. and Thursday at 6:00p.m. at MacArthur Elementary School.
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