Wahluke district patrons to vote on capital levy Feb. 11

MATTAWA — Wahluke School District voters will decide the fate of a three-year capital projects levy in a special election Feb. 11. District officials are asking for $2.58 million over three years. 

If the levy is approved, property owners would pay an estimated 75 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value. If it’s approved, the owner of property valued at $250,000 would pay $187.50 per year in taxes, while a person whose property is valued at $300,000 would pay $225 per year over the three years.  

The proposal requires a bare majority, 50% plus one vote, to pass. 

Wahluke Superintendent Andy Harlow said the money would be used to update fire alarms and security systems at three elementary schools and Wahluke Junior High. The money also would pay off a loan taken out to replace the heating-cooling system at Mattawa Elementary. 

“This blows my mind, but we have to replace the wiring, the panels and the keyboard systems that run our fire alarm systems and our security systems in four of our oldest buildings,” Harlow said.  

Paying off the heating-cooling system will cost about $2.2 million, with the rest going to the fire and security alarm upgrades.  

“This is our fire alarm system and safety-security alarming system. Two different systems, but they both have to be replaced. In many cases they’re the original wiring back to 1986,” he said.  

Wahluke voters rejected a capital levy in 2024, and district officials revised the proposal as a result. Requests for money to fix the Wahluke High School track and add lights to the WHS soccer field were removed. District officials also cut the levy from four to three years. 

Harlow said voters he has talked to were skeptical of the track project, so district officials dropped that from the request. The alarm systems, however, are aging and need upgrades. 

“We’ve had false alarm trips. We had a false alarm over (winter) break – we actually had two in our freezer and our maintenance guy had to come up (and investigate). We know that we lost some food this summer because an alarm did not get tripped,” Harlow said. 

The systems require modernization; the MES heating-cooling system had to be replaced, and Harlow said both projects reflect the district’s attempts to catch up with deferred maintenance.  

Budget constraints delayed projects, sometimes for years, he said, until they couldn’t be put off any longer. 

“We’ve just kind of been living from emergency to emergency,” he said. 

He cited the upgrades at Mattawa Elementary as an example. That project had been under consideration for about a decade, he said.

“We had to take the loan out last year because it had to be done, but now we’re asking to pay that off because that debt is not going to allow us to do these other projects that are going to need to be done,” Harlow said. 

Wahluke, like all school districts nationwide, received additional federal funding during the COVID-19 pandemic, some of which was used to address some of the maintenance and equipment needs.  

“We used those (federal) dollars to put money into our roof at Saddle Mountain (Elementary),” he said. “We were able to put in a new video system – that was almost a million dollars. We bought student tech; that was another million. So, with those (federal) dollars we were able to fund some of those huge projects, but at no cost to taxpayers,” he said. 

The additional federal money ran out, however, and there are still pending projects, he said. District officials are working to develop a longer-term plan to determine how the district can address those needs over time. 

Ballots must be postmarked by Feb. 11. The ballot drop box in Mattawa is located at 210 Government Road, the parking lot of Mattawa Community Health Clinic. 

Wahluke capital levy request

Request is for $2.58 million over three years, or about $860,000 each year 

Tax rate estimated at 75 cents per $1,000 of assessed property value  

Owner of property valued at $250,000 would pay $187.50 per year if the levy is approved. A person whose property is valued at $300,000 would pay $225 per year 

Ballots must be postmarked by Feb. 11 

Ballot drop box at 210 Government Road