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Voices in Urban Education
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VUE Number 7, Spring 2005
| VUE Home | Archives | Order Print Copy |
EXCERPT:
Funding and Rebuilding Schools as Community Learning Centers: Akron, Ohio
By Laraine Duncan and Donna Loomis
Giselle Laraine Duncan is education policy advisor to Akron's Mayor Donald Plusquellic.
> Complete Biography
Donna Loomis is a retired deputy superintendent of the Akron Public Schools.
> Complete Biography
After the mayor and the community successfully navigated the political shoals of raising taxes and gained access to federal matching funds, the city and the school district became partners in the challenging task of rebuilding schools as community learning centers.
In May 2003, the voters of Akron, Ohio, voted overwhelmingly in favor of Issue 10, a measure that raised the city income tax from 2 percent to 2.25 percent to fund a fifteen-year plan to rebuild and remodel schools and convert them into “community learning centers.” The measure was sponsored by Mayor Donald Plusquellic as a way of raising matching funds for a state school-construction grant, while also providing an opportunity to create community centers in school buildings and redevelop neighborhoods.
Voices in Urban Education editor Robert Rothman spoke with Laraine Duncan, Mayor Plusquellic's education policy advisor, and Donna Loomis, a retired deputy superintendent of the Akron Public Schools, about the campaign for Issue 10 and the benefits and challenges of implementing it.
How did Issue 10 come about?
LARAINE DUNCAN: There was a huge pot of state money that would go to, first, urban schools, to refurbish all the schools in the system. That meant a sizeable amount of money for Akron. We had to match 41 percent of it.
At the initiative of the mayor, we put a sales tax on the ballot [in November 2002]. In Ohio, a sales tax has to be countywide. There was a lengthy process to go through the county council, and then the city council, to get the issue on the ballot.
It was a hard, expensive campaign. It went down in flames countywide. It passed the city easily. People in the city understood it. The way it was going to work, proceeds from the sales tax would have been divided up among all the seventeen school districts in Summit County, per student. All school districts could spend money for capital improvements they deemed worthy.But, by law, we had to form a monitoring committee, and there was resentment of that. The attitude was: Akron would be telling us how to spend our money. That wasnÕt the issue at all. The committee would essentially be a rubber stamp. Our feeling was: If a school board wants to spend money on bleachers, thatÕs their choice.
There were a couple of other school issues on the ballot in the county, and that hurt us.We tried to demonstrate to school districts that they would get more money from the sales tax than from a levy, but most didnÕt understand that, and they worked against it. It got pretty nasty. A lot of it was anti-Akron. But we lost, and we lost the chance for the match money.
Our mayor is not a person who gives up easily, and he didnÕt want to give up $800 million over fifteen years. He found something obscure in the Ohio revised code that allows a municipality to pass an income tax for community learning centers. He wrote a ballot measure, had it looked at by attorneys, and it passed muster.
The beauty of it was that it would be levied on anybody who works in Akron, not on pension income, Social Security income, or investment income. The second time around, it passed with 64 percent of the vote. The taxes began collecting last January.With the income, we are purchasing bonds, and the proceeds go to the Akron Public Schools as the districtÕs match.
Archives
Community Partners
VUE Number 7, Spring 2005
| VUE Home | Archives | Order Print Copy |
EXCERPT:
Funding and Rebuilding Schools as Community Learning Centers: Akron, Ohio
By Laraine Duncan and Donna Loomis
Giselle Laraine Duncan is education policy advisor to Akron's Mayor Donald Plusquellic.
> Complete Biography
Donna Loomis is a retired deputy superintendent of the Akron Public Schools.
> Complete Biography
After the mayor and the community successfully navigated the political shoals of raising taxes and gained access to federal matching funds, the city and the school district became partners in the challenging task of rebuilding schools as community learning centers.
In May 2003, the voters of Akron, Ohio, voted overwhelmingly in favor of Issue 10, a measure that raised the city income tax from 2 percent to 2.25 percent to fund a fifteen-year plan to rebuild and remodel schools and convert them into “community learning centers.” The measure was sponsored by Mayor Donald Plusquellic as a way of raising matching funds for a state school-construction grant, while also providing an opportunity to create community centers in school buildings and redevelop neighborhoods.
Voices in Urban Education editor Robert Rothman spoke with Laraine Duncan, Mayor Plusquellic's education policy advisor, and Donna Loomis, a retired deputy superintendent of the Akron Public Schools, about the campaign for Issue 10 and the benefits and challenges of implementing it.
How did Issue 10 come about?
LARAINE DUNCAN: There was a huge pot of state money that would go to, first, urban schools, to refurbish all the schools in the system. That meant a sizeable amount of money for Akron. We had to match 41 percent of it.
At the initiative of the mayor, we put a sales tax on the ballot [in November 2002]. In Ohio, a sales tax has to be countywide. There was a lengthy process to go through the county council, and then the city council, to get the issue on the ballot.
It was a hard, expensive campaign. It went down in flames countywide. It passed the city easily. People in the city understood it. The way it was going to work, proceeds from the sales tax would have been divided up among all the seventeen school districts in Summit County, per student. All school districts could spend money for capital improvements they deemed worthy.But, by law, we had to form a monitoring committee, and there was resentment of that. The attitude was: Akron would be telling us how to spend our money. That wasnÕt the issue at all. The committee would essentially be a rubber stamp. Our feeling was: If a school board wants to spend money on bleachers, thatÕs their choice.
There were a couple of other school issues on the ballot in the county, and that hurt us.We tried to demonstrate to school districts that they would get more money from the sales tax than from a levy, but most didnÕt understand that, and they worked against it. It got pretty nasty. A lot of it was anti-Akron. But we lost, and we lost the chance for the match money.
Our mayor is not a person who gives up easily, and he didnÕt want to give up $800 million over fifteen years. He found something obscure in the Ohio revised code that allows a municipality to pass an income tax for community learning centers. He wrote a ballot measure, had it looked at by attorneys, and it passed muster.
The beauty of it was that it would be levied on anybody who works in Akron, not on pension income, Social Security income, or investment income. The second time around, it passed with 64 percent of the vote. The taxes began collecting last January.With the income, we are purchasing bonds, and the proceeds go to the Akron Public Schools as the districtÕs match.
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