Second attempt at school bond election fairly certain

ROYAL CITY - After the narrowest of losses in February, it's fairly certain the Royal School District will run a new school construction bond election in April.

According to business manager David Andra, the board was having a special meeting yesterday. He said there was no doubt board members were going to approve a new attempt.

The district needed a 60 percent favorable vote in February to win the election. It got 59.13 percent, or 560 yes votes to 387.

Andra noted the consensus of the board meeting on Feb. 25 was that the district should go for a bond immediately. The board set yesterday's special meeting to give official approval and announce it to the county auditor on time for the next election.

The election will come around quickly, set for April 23. That means ballots will start to arrive in voters' mail at the start of April.

Andra noted the pro-bond forces have already started campaigning. About 70 appeared at the facilities meeting that preceded the last board meeting.

"It was very positive, with everyone saying to go forward," he said.

Andra said the campaign will probably target the 698 registered voters in the district who did not vote in February. Because of short notice, nothing is likely to change in the bond request.

The District will be seeking approval of the sale of $8.75 million in construction bonds. Approval would bring $4.4 million in state matching funds. The district would throw in $1.1 million it has saved for a total of $14.25 million in new school construction.

That amount would allow the district to add four classrooms to the high school and 14 classrooms and a gymnasium to the fifth-grade pod to create a new intermediate school.

If that were accomplished, Royal Schools would change from elementary (K-5, including pod), middle (6-8) and high school (9-12) to K-3 elementary, 4-6 intermediate, 7-8 middle and 9-12 high school.

The bonds would be retired over 15 years at an interest rate of 3.21 percent. The property tax assessment to accomplish that would be $1.19 per $1,000 of property value. In other words, approval would cost the owner of a $100,000 home $119 per year in added property tax.