On May 2, 2017, the Sheridan Community School district will be holding a special election to renew the district’s operational referendum. After several parent and open meetings, it was determined, due to several factors accumulating on the district simultaneously and reducing its current funding, that it was important for the district to run the renewal this year in order to maintain current programs and levels of achievement. While the district will be asking for a slight increase in the referendum rate itself, it will still maintain an overall tax rate below that of just three years ago and well below the rate at which the district first ran the referendum in 2012. In fact, the overall tax rate for SCS has dropped 15 cents since 2014. Very few districts have been able to show such a significant drop in such a short period of time.
The district is looking to renew its referendum for several reasons. Over the last several years, the district has lost over $430,000 from state dollars and is projected to lose another $330,000 in the upcoming three years. Overall, the district is looking to recoup a small portion of these losses. The increased referendum rate does not recoup all of this money; it is closer to only a third of overall losses.
The focus of the referendum funds will be continued excellence for the district as they look to maintain class sizes, enhance existing and needed programs, and continue the success they are seeing in graduation rates and student accomplishment.
The district will be hosting a public forum in order to answer any and all questions more in-depth for those interested. The date of the open forum will be April 18 starting at 6:00 at the Sheridan Public Library. For further information, please reach out to Dr. Mundy at dmundy@att.net or visit the referendum informational website at sheridanyes.com.