Preliminary renovation concepts for three schools in Floyd County were revealed Monday night, but the board for the New Albany-Floyd County Consolidated School Corp. needs votes to make the projects happen.
Complete overhauls of Green Valley Elementary School and Slate Run Elementary School, along with at least a partial renovation of the Prosser Career Education Center, were presented to the board at their Monday meeting with an estimated cost of about $63 million.
But in order to fund the projects, the district would seek a referendum, likely in May 2015. Brad Snyder, deputy superintendent, said that will require a lot of community support.
“As a state, less than 50 percent of these [kinds of referendums] passed at 47 percent,” Snyder said. “We’re really hopeful that the voters of Floyd County believe in their public schools and us to support us. We’re really trying to support the community, make our assets shine and give the community something to be proud of.”
He said with the debt of the renovation project for New Albany High School getting ready to fall off in 2017, the district will shoot for a tax-neutral solution that will impact rates at about 17 cents per $100,000 of property value for 20 years.
Snyder said though there’s a perception that referendums have a better chance of passing in a primary election — where voter turnout tends to be lower than general elections — he said there’s no data that supports those claims.
But whatever public support the district gets, they’ll have to earn before the board considers a resolution to put the referendum to ballot in January 2015 through the county election board.
State law prohibits campaigning for referendums after they’ve been approved to appear on a ballot. Snyder said before the board signs off on that, they’ll probably hire a public-relations firm and determine what kinds of campaigning and advertising would be most effective in getting the word out. But he also said they’ll probably ask Parent Teacher Organizations at schools to make mention of the referendum as they begin campaigning, as well as including information on it in weekly newsletters at schools.
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