The 7.5 million dollar question for Heights

The Wisconsin Heights School District will be presenting residents with another referendum next week. In the wake of a $27 million facilities referendum in the fall, the District has decided to go forward with the question of a $7.5 million auditorium project. When the board initially debated putting the $27 million facilities referendum, the auditorium project was still in play. After a lengthy discussion at a critical meeting, board members decided that with the initial $27 million ask, another $7.5 million was too much. The support from the students for an auditorium project was loud and clear. The board has already planned to revisit the auditorium project in the spring. With letters to the editor, public speaking at meetings, and presentations at board meetings, the voice of the students was clear. They wanted a new auditorium. The board voted six to one on Monday, January 25, with Mike Wagner the lone dissenting vote against the referendum question being on the ballot.   Previous referendum costing less   As the Wisconsin Heights single campus plan has come into shape over the past few years, the projected property tax load has dropped. Local taxpayers can expect to see a $50 per $100,000 of value savings in their taxes, compared to initial projections several years ago. The District also saved $4.6 million on the total cost of borrowing as bond issues came into focus. The District’s original plan was to borrow $27 million with an estimated interest rate of 3.2 percent. They assumed equalized value in the area would increase by 3.5 percent annually. The new and current plan carves out a place for the District to earn interest prior to officially borrowing funds. This involved a Bank Anticipatory Note for $27 million, and collecting the interest from that. That interest then lowered the amount needed for borrowing. The Anticipatory Note will be paid off in March. The total amount borrowed will drop from $27 million to $24 million. The drop is driven in part by the interest from the Bank Anticipatory Note, as well $1.4 million in taxes collected from 2020-21. The District locked in low interest rate on their bond issues, at 1.64 percent. In all, this means the District has to borrow $3 million less that the original $27 million that was projected. Most importantly to taxpayers, the mill rate--initially projected to be $186 per hundred thousand dollars of equalized value--will drop to $145. That drop is even more significant when taking into account the District’s projection several years ago of $203 per hundred thousand dollars of equalized value.   Polling data   School Perceptions, the company that performed the District’s fall survey, provided data to show public feeling on a new auditorium. The takeaway was that those who supported a new auditorium now came out to less than 50 percent of survey takers. A 50 percent threshold in needed to at least indicate a majority of votes will approve the referendum. School Perceptions noted that if those favoring a two to five year project date were added to those wanting one now, the percentage of those in support rose to about 60 percent.  Another point of emphasis was the “tax threshold” of community members. School Perceptions emphasized that this remains the same as when the survey was taken, and prior to the fall referendum. The tax threshold shows how much of a tax increase taxpayers are willing to pay for. School perceptions also noted that, as the survey indicated, support for voters who were not affiliated with the school--no students, no employees--is critical.