In less than a month Washington Community School District residents are asked to vote on whether general obligation bonds totaling $25 million should be issued to build a new middle school addition to the current high school building.

Superintendent Willie Stone updated the school board last week on his progress with communicating to the public about the special election happening on September 14th, with absentee voting set to begin on August 25th. The board has worked for the past year to determine how to address the century-old middle school, and after community meetings and two online surveys were held, the majority favored a high school addition. Stone said a recent meeting with the Washington County Farm Bureau gave him productive feedback on how to present the referendum information to the public, “One of the main questions I get asked is, ‘If the bond issue doesn’t pass will the school do as they did in the past and just pay for it through revenue sales tax?’ We just don’t have the capacity to do that, that’s not even a thought. So I had that down there in my frequently asked questions but they said that’s one that you probably want to put up top so that people know that immediately.”

Another factor that the farm bureau members mentioned should be a priority in these community presentations is tax implications, as this bond issue wouldn’t increase the district’s current property tax levy of $2.70. The district has also planned out the project to happen in 2023 in case a bond referendum were to fail on the first vote. The referendum needs at least 60% of the vote to pass.