MLSD levy impacts on safety, health and facilities

MOSES LAKE – The Moses Lake School District has an Educational Programs and Operations levy on the Feb. 11 ballot. The levy and whether it passes or not, will have impacts on school resource officers, nursing staff and facilities and maintenance according to the district.  

Last spring, the district had a double levy failure paired alongside accounting errors which resulted in a freeze of spending, reduction of staff and changes in departments including health and maintenance. Although safety and security were not reduced with the prior levy failures, the district has said there will be reductions if the current levy measure fails.  

If the 2025 EP&O levy fails, MLSD officials have said there will be reductions of at least $400,000 for safety, security and health and at least $500,000 in maintenance and custodial spending. These reductions will include school resource officers – law enforcement officers assigned to beats on campuses — security personnel, health staff and reduced use of spaces such as gyms and fields. However, if the levy passes there will be availability of school resource officers, security and staff, increased day and night custodial care and maintenance of buildings and grounds.   

Moses Lake Police Department Captain Jeff Sursely, MLSD nurse Penny Mayo and custodian Casey Gleason discuss the changes they saw over the recent school year and their thoughts regarding the future of the district in their respective departments.  The district’s SROs are provided in cooperation with MLPD.  

Safety 

Last year, the district did not make cuts to security and safety, according to Sursely. The district has three SROs and one more soon to join after completing academy. However, if the current levy does not pass with voters, that staffing level could change.  

“The SRO is kind of a trifecta – we've got the enforcement, we've got the safety and security, but we also have the counseling and mentoring piece,” Sursely said. “If the levy fails, not just the students will be missing out on that counseling and mentoring position, but the school administrators lean on our SROs a lot when they have kids in crisis.” 

Sursely said he was an SRO in the early 2000s and said the impact of officers within schools is “astronomically beneficial.” 

“I'll give you two sides of the spectrum,” Sursely said. “When we have a critical incident where students making threats to the school, the SROs are able to immediately go to the home, do a home visit, ensure that all weapons are secured, and just chase down a lot of the little gremlins that are associated with those calls providing that safe environment for the school and all the students. Then they get to the bottom of what the potential or possible threat was, and to verify the validity of the threat, or to determine that it was not a threat.” 

The other example Sursely said was when he was an SRO, he had a student who stole food from the cafeteria and was caught. After talking with the student, he realized she had been kicked out of her home, had no money and no food and that is why she was stealing.  

“Rather than doing discipline, we got a plan together to get her help and allow her to still finish high school and she wasn't disciplined, she was helped,” Sursely said. “I think that's where the SRO steps in. Disciplines are the last step with students and kids.” 

Sursely said he is concerned about negative impacts a lack of SROs will have on students because officers won’t be available for those prevention and relationship-building situations. He said he is also concerned if the program is reduced or removed, it will not return to the same level. MLPD and MLSD have spent 25 years establishing the program.   

“We have school districts from around the region that reach out to us on how our program operates, because it is such a healthy, vibrant program, and a lot of them have modeled off our program,” Sursely said. “Obviously, if our program is mothballed or goes away, not just our school district, but other school districts will lose a wealth of knowledge and how SRO programs are run and should be run.” 

Health 

Mayo, a school nurse in the Moses Lake School District, has expressed concerns over the last year. Mayo, who has been working with the district since 2011, said there have been increased challenges faced by school nurses this school year due to budget constraints. 

“The only reason we have supplies is because we have donors that have donated,” Mayo said. “I don’t even know what the teachers are doing. I’m guessing they’re buying supplies themselves.”  

She said the tightening of budgets forced staff to monitor and lock down supplies, stating, “Everything is locked.”  

Mayo said there have even been times this year when she has spent her personal money to buy supplies for students.  

Mayo’s caseload has nearly doubled this year, increasing from approximately 900 students last year to about 1,500 students this year after staffing and supply reductions. The nursing staff was reduced by nearly 36% following the failed levy. 

“I worry all the time. My job satisfaction is just different because I don’t have enough time,” she said. “I just worry that I'm not going to be available to catch something where I normally would have been able to.” 

With declining resources, Mayo said the need for proactive planning regarding the care of students with complex health issues had increased. 

“We had 11 nurses, now we have seven,” Mayo said. “We are running on fumes trying to make it work.”  

These staffing reductions translate to increased pressure on remaining nurses, often leaving them to cover multiple buildings and students in need of specialized care, Mayo said.  

She said that another levy failure would increase strains on her, the other nursing staff and students who need a nurse’s help during the school day. 

“I think all of us feel like we're letting down our students and parents because we can't be accessible like we need to, and we understand,” Mayo said. “I mean, it's the nature of how it goes, but the levy failing again and reducing staff further, I can't even fathom what that would look like.” 

Facilities 

Gleason, a custodian at Garden Heights Elementary, described the immediate effects on his job and his concerns regarding the future if the current levy fails as well. 

Gleason, who has been with the district for four years, noted that the lack of funding has led to significant changes in the availability of supplies and equipment necessary for maintaining school facilities.  

"With no funding, we had to stop all purchases on everything," he said. "So, you know, just simple things, like the urinal screens ... we had to cut that." 

The levy failure has also resulted in increased workloads for custodial staff due to staffing cuts. 

"I'm doing, I would say, 12 hours of work within a seven-hour shift,” he said. 

He mentioned that several custodians are now responsible for cleaning more classrooms than before, some with up to 20 classrooms each.  

According to Gleason, the double levy failure resulted in the loss of approximately 15 positions in the custodian and maintenance team.  

"We had to restructure, and some positions were eliminated," he said. "As soon as they were let go, we noticed the impact immediately." 

Gleason said his principal has been frequently stepping in to help him complete tasks, ones he doesn’t have time for with strictly set hours and less assistance.  

“I just think that through these hard times, they're stepping up, and the principals are wiping tables down,” Gleason said. “They help mopping floors. I've had my principal help me mop the floor because I just didn't have the time.” 

Looking toward the future, Gleason expressed concerns about whether the levy will pass.  

"It's going to be really hard to get things fixed and maintained," he said. “It's going to be really hard to get things clean. The buildings are going to start deteriorating and being dirty if we don’t have the staff.”   

As the community prepares for decisions regarding the current levy, Gleason encourages voters to educate themselves. 

"Read the levy facts, go to the board meetings, ask those hard questions," he said. "Don’t speculate. Talk to the superintendent. She welcomes that." 

    Casey Gleason, a custodian at Garden Heights Elementary said he has noticed significant changes over the past school year in regard to his job after the double levy failure last spring. The district said there will be further reductions of at least $500,000 to custodial and maintenance, if the current levy fails.
  

    Moses Lake School Resource Officer Ray Lopez is based at Columbia Middle School. The current Educational Programs and Operations levy will determine whether the school district is able to keep SROs within schools.