Voters Deciding Kellogg School District’s Fate Tuesday (ID)

April 27, 2010

The future of K-12 education in Kellogg will be put to voters Tuesday as they will decide whether or not to support the renewal of a two-year $2.78 Million levy.

The reality is if voters fail to renew the levy the school district will be forced to eliminate all extracurricular activities, all elective classes and that in turn will mean laying off teachers.

It will mean the band won’t need to practice for pep rallies before football games and yearbook staffers won’t need to take pictures of the band and the football team. Why? Because the band, football team and the yearbook would all get cut if the levy fails to pass.

“I didn’t think this would happen,” Kellogg School District Superintendent Sandra Pmmerening said.

If the levy doesn’t pass it will mean the Kellogg School District will be able to offer their students a bare bones education with no sports, no extracurricular activities and no electives. The cuts run so deep that not even science will be taught in the elementary schools.

After a maintenance levy didn’t pass in March the district made significant cuts to their staff, kindergarten program, high school sports and they got rid of their alternative school. Now they need the voters to renew the levy or the cuts will go deeper.

“Bare bones and its pretty sad,” Superintendent Pmmerening said. “It wouldn’t even be a school anymore it would just be a place with some classes.”

Some students like Zach Pickering say that if the levy fails to pass their parents will move out of Kellogg.

“My dad is looking at places to relocate and different jobs he can take,” he said.

Pmmerening is afraid of the levy failing and families like the Pickerings relocate to other districts

“If you cut back because times are tough you take the legs out of your community and people leave,” she said.

People in Kellogg against the levy say they aren’t voting for it because it will raise their taxes but the district superintendent says taxes will actually go down.

“This community has a history of supporting schools,” Pmmerening said.

There are approximately 1,000 voters in the school district that would be voting on the levy and they need just 51-percent of them to vote yes for the levy to pass.