In all but a handful of communities Tuesday, voters in western and central Montana soundly defeated their public schools’ requests to help pay for big expenses.
Western Montana’s urban schools fared much better than their rural counterparts in school levy elections. Voters in Missoula, Butte and Bozeman passed most funding requests on the ballot. The tax revenue will help pay for teacher salaries, technology needs and safety upgrades.
Many small schools in rural areas will be forced to tighten their belts after voters rejected levies. But so will Helena Public Schools, one of the state’s largest districts. It’s been grappling with a budgetary imbalance for years driven by declining enrollment and rising expenses like insurance, technology and inflation.
“We have a system of school funding that’s broken,” superintendent Rex Weltz told MTPR in a phone interview.
Weltz said the state’s rules for public school funding constantly force districts and their taxpayers to choose between critical facility upgrades, or funding teacher salaries; maintaining technology, or improving safety.
Helena voters last year passed a gargantuan school bond that will pay for new schools. But Weltz says none of that money can go toward the schools’ operating budget. Now, he says difficult cuts are on the way.
“This cyclic pattern that you described is hard on our community, it’s hard on our students — but it’s extremely hard on our district staff,” Weltz said.
Kalispell voters also defeated all school levies. It’s part of a multi-year losing streak for many districts at the ballot box.
