This is the second post of a two-part series to discuss our District’s finances - the positives that have occurred in the last few years and what my commitment is going forward in my next term.
I'm proud to have been able to vote for our referendum debt restructure. The reality was that the approval of taking on the referendum debt in 2016 was close. There was a significant portion of our community who did not vote for it. I'm hopeful that many of those who were originally opposed to the referendum have taken advantage of some of the improvements that were made to our facilities, especially the new PAC.
In the end, this restructuring of the referendum debt is going to allow the District to pay off that debt up to three years early. What does that mean to our community's property owners? It means that we will eliminate three years of payments that are included in your annual property taxes. Depending on your property, that could mean upwards of hundreds, if not thousands of dollars saved by each property owner.
I've talked about our balanced budget, our restructure of the referendum debt, and the improvement of our fund balance and how we have improved our financial standing. I like that kind of conservative approach to our District's finances. It has put us on a solid ground financially where I don't see any need to ask our community to take on an operating referendum.
There are so many Districts in our areas - Greendale, Hamilton, Lake Country, Milwaukee Public Schools, North Lake, South Milwaukee - that are taking operational referendums to their communities just to fund the regular operations of their districts.
In 2022, there were 45 operational referendums in Wisconsin (about 10% of all districts in the state), and last year, there were 54 operational referendums.
I'm committed to continue being smart with our finances and to continue to vote for balanced budgets and to improve our District's finances. We can live within our means.
The primary is on February 20th! Please make plans to head to the polls on that Tuesday and vote Pawlak. Thank you!
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