Portland Public Schools Delays Bond Measure Until May

Moving to recover from the sudden resignation of Superintendent Carole Smith following a critical report of the district's handling of a lead in water crisis, Portland Public Schools is putting off a planned bond measure.

The measure, which would have funded hundreds of millions in needed capital improvements, had been planned for the November ballot.

The bond is being moved to the May 2017 ballot so that the board can focus on the need to find a new superintendent.

"To be clear - our needs have not changed," said the vice chairwoman of the board, Amy Kohnstamm. "Our school buildings are in great need of urgent, basic repairs and full modernization.

"To be a truly great city we need to have great schools with great facilities for our kids and the community.”

The board said they also want to spend more time working on the details of the proposal.

The measure being considered would have provided $750 million to rebuild two high schools, provide significant changes to one middle school, and major environmental changes throughout the system.

The bond would have provided for the rebuilding of Lincoln and Madison High Schools and a complete refurbishing of Kellogg Middle School to get it ready to once again receive students.

The bond would have also provided for $300 million to provide environmental improvements throughout the system.

One part of the plan that may now be reconsidered involves Benson Polytechnic High School.

The measure that had been planned for November would have had rebuilding Benson broken into components that would be paid for in part by this bond measure and by a second measure planned for 2020.

That idea received a lot of community pushback and including Benson in the proposal for May be considered.

The district had thought that they needed to decide between including a rebuild of Benson or including more environmental and safety fixes - working on projects like, seismic stability, and fixes for lead and radon.

Polling done for the district indicated a strong support for the safety and environmental fixes.

If approved by voters, the measure would increase property tax bills by $1.04 per $1,000 of assessed value.

The board did reiterate that they are still committed to providing water dispenser service for all PPS buildings in the coming year.

Testing found that many PPS buildings had higher than acceptable levels of lead.

It was a report that was highly critical of the district's handling of that situation that contributed to Smith's decision to quit.