The analysis is complete.  As a vote “yes” resident each time the Mounds View district has put a referendum on the ballot in the last 15 years, the same is true for the 2013 ballot measure– both as a citizen and as a formal position of Hakes for Mounds View School Board ’13.

To arrive at the campaign position, I needed to push past the subjective emotion of wanting the best for students to the reach the objective basis of financial stewardship.   My years of financial experience required nothing less.

From a variety of angles, the request to ask voters to extend the existing operating levy is a reasonable one:

1. It is only an operating levy, not a capital expenditure or other type of special levy.
2. Compared to many other districts, 621 has been modest re: both teacher pay and facilities use.  Unlike other districts, the only increase District 621 will see is in the 1.5% per year rise in the per pupil allotment provided by the state.
3. The  Association of Metropolitan Area School Districts accepts the plausibility of Mounds View being the only metropolitan district not asking for an increase.
4. Key business leaders do not object to the district request.
5. With Ramsey County having certified a zero increase in the 2014 county property tax levy, 621 taxpayers are likely to see their overall property tax bill remain constant for the first time in years.
6. The Mounds View Schools have had sound financial leadership and unqualified independent audit reports.

With that, it’s ‘six on one hand’ and …  fewer on the other.  One anti-levy faction suggests the District should wait until 2014 to consider it, after the repayment of previously borrowed state monies has begun.  (This year’s ballot question deals with an $11 million annual amount that doesn’t expire until the end of 2014.)

For the record, however, this campaign supports the levy measure, and the effort by Neighbors United to bring about its passage.