Digging Into Cleveland Heights School Levy, Issue 109

CLEVELAND HEIGHTS, OH - Issue 109 will be voted on by residents on Nov. 9. The proposed 5.5 mill levy would support Cleveland Heights-University Heights schools and fund them for the next five years. However, opponents of the levy say that it's a short-term solution that will lead to bigger problems down the road.

"It's right for our kids and for our community," said Talisa Dixon, the district's superintendent. "Schools are funded by property tax assessments."

The problem for the district is that this levy failed in 2015. Dixon says the district didn't effectively communicate the need to raise the money. Issue 109's opponents say the district is blatantly ignoring the will of residents.

Garry Kanter, an opponent of the levy, says that the district needs to prove its commitment to making real cuts to what he sees as wasteful spending and stop ignoring the voice of Cleveland Heights residents.

"We already said no to this tax increase," he said. "The district needs to control its spending because somehow the cost per student per year goes up every single year."

Cutting Costs

The district says that it has managed to cut expenses by $8 million since Issue 109 failed in 2015, living up to a promise the superintendent made following the defeat of that levy. Dixon says the district has reduced the number of teachers, increasing the average class size from 15 or 16 students per teacher to 22 students per teacher.

"We also cut a lot of supplemental contracts and consolidated some of our extracurriculars," she said. "For example, our school newspaper and the speech club are now conducted by one teacher."

Dixon announced in March that the district was cutting 52 staff positions as it looked to save about $3.5 million. To compensate for the decrease in teachers though, the district has been attempting to provide additional support via tutoring services. What the cost is for those services isn't initially clear.

While these decreases may be a start, opponents of the school levy feel the district still has a ways to go. One example of wasteful spending Kanter points to is the high salaries paid to the school's nurses, four of who are making more than $90,000 a year. That's significantly higher than the $71,000 mean salary that registered nurses make according to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.

"Our district chose to employ nurses instead of nurses aides," Dixon said about the issue. "We wanted a qualified nurse on-staff even though they may be making higher salaries than they would in other organizations."

Yet salaries make up about 85 percent of the district's budget and have been a point of much contention with 109's opponents. The district is also employing guidance counselors, psychologists and other staff members.

Another reason Kanter believes the district can do more to cut costs is the dwindling student population. Over the past nine years, the district has lost 900 students. Enrollment in 2016 is now at 5,400 students. In 2007, there were 6,300 students in the district.

Dixon told Patch.com that the district is spending about $16,000 per student, though it spends more on students with special needs.

While she conceded the decrease in student population does mean some corresponding savings for the district (though she didn't specify how much), she said the district is still investing in district wide programs.

"We still need guidance counselors, psychologists, etc.," she said. "It's not as much of a savings as folks think. Remember, 85 percent of our funding is used for staff."

However, a presentation from the district put the spending rate on salaries and benefits at 76 percent.

The Next Levy

One of the other major hangups for Issue 109's opponents is the prospect of a second, significantly larger levy on the horizon. The levy's supporters have labelled Issue 109 as one of the smallest levies, at 5.5 mills, that have been brought to the community. While that may be true, 109's opponents say, another, much larger levy is coming in 2020.

Kanter says that while this year's levy would give the district enough funding to get through 2019, by 2020 the district would be back asking for a levy almost twice as large as this year's.

"That's regardless of if 109 passes or not," he says. "They'll have to come back in 2020 and ask for a 10.5 mil."

For her part, Dixon doesn't deny that the district will have to come back in the future. She reiterated that levies are how Ohio schools get funded. She declined to get into the specifics of what a future levy may look like.

"It has been five years since we passed an operating levy," she says. "We didn't properly demonstrate our need last year and we didn't distinguish the levy from the bond issue. We took a year and stretched our budget to try and hear the community."

Part of what prevented last year's levy from being passed and has created some tension between the district and at least some residents, is the perception of Cleveland Heights Schools as being less than transparent. It's a perception Dixon is working actively to rectify.

"In 2014-2015 we worked on a 5-Year Plan and part of that was to be more transparent," she says. "We are not, in any way, trying to deceive our community."

She said that one example of the district attempting to respond to the community's calls for being more forthcoming in its communication is the release of its per student spending. She said that residents had been calling for that information to be made available and the district is including it in a Quality Profile that is being mailed out.

"We want to be more informative," Dixon said. "We heard the community saying that our behavior needed to change."

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