RRSD

After Rogue River residents overwhelmingly voted in 2022 against a Rogue River School District bond, the district is asking them to vote “yes” this spring on a new measure officials believe is more reflective of the community’s wishes.

Measure 15-208 was defeated 57% to 42% on Nov. 8, 2022, but come May 16, the district hopes Measure 15-213 — a $4.4 million bond that could be used to attain a matching grant — will pass.

Heather Friend, a Rogue River School Board member, said the board held several long meetings on the possibility of a new bond before it voted Feb. 7 to place Measure 15-213 on the ballot.

“I feel like it will pass. I wasn’t really confident with it passing last time — I feel like it was because our goals were too vast. We had too many projects on the bond,” Friend said.

It didn’t hurt, she said, that the school board members attended an Oregon School Boards Association Conference in Portland to learn the ins and outs of how to pitch a bond to voters.

“Lots of people have reached out saying they want to see it passed, and they’re happy with the direction it’s going,” Friend said.

But Julie Niles-Fry, a former Rogue River School Board member, said that, like 2022, she will not be voting for the district’s ballot measure, despite officials’ best efforts to adapt the proposal based on community feedback.

“No shiny objects in these times for me,” Niles-Fry said.

According to chatter on social media she had read about the measure, “people are not going for it,” she added.

If passed, Measure 15-213 would contain many of the same elements that district officials wanted in 2022, including construction of a separate middle school, safety and security upgrades, plumbing and electrical upgrades and a $4 million matching grant from the state.

“Those features are so very important for the schools,” Friend said.

An annex would be built adjacent to the current junior/senior high school, located at 1898 E. Evans Creek Road.

“Any parent that has walked into that school — and realized where those junior high kids are — can understand why a different building is needed,” Friend said.

Junior high students share bathrooms, locker rooms and common spaces with high school students, Friend added.

“Having this annex for the junior high would allow students to feel like they have their own school instead of just crammed into a hallway at the high school,” Friend said.

Niles-Fry points to the annex as the prime reason she will not vote for the bond.

“Yes, I know it’s a shiny object,” she said. “But we don’t need another building because they’re about to build another.”

Niles-Fry was referring to a proposed wellness center and early learning center that would serve pre-school and the health care needs of all district students.

“I just think they (the district) needs to rethink some things,” Niles-Fry said.

Friend noted that the bond money voters could approve next month is separate from any bond funds the district could use to build a wellness center and pre-school.

In terms of Measure 15-213, Friend was surprised the district qualified yet again for a $4 million matching grant, something officials believed they might not see again because the state program is competitive.

“For the state to grant it two times in a row feels pretty special, and it’s something that we shouldn’t ignore because that money is just going to go somewhere else,” Friend said.

Niles-Fry is, in part, concerned about the match because the only way the district can obtain it is by passing a bond.

“We have to buy $4 million to get $4 million,” she said.

And if the bond passes, the grant would help pay for the junior high school annex, which she does not agree with.

“It is not helping education in our schools,” Niles-Fry said.

There are notable differences between the last bond and this one, which Friend said is a response to feedback from voters.

Measure 15-213 would fund the creation of single points of entry for Rogue River Elementary School’s east and west building divisions. Door security at the other district schools will be addressed through the bond funds if it passes.

“There are certain specifics we can share, but I feel like it would probably be negligent to tell the population every single safety hole on a building,” Friend said. “But I feel like, yes, specifics are important; we did list some.”

Niles-Fry believes, on the other hand, that the district should make public all of the new security plans to deter potential criminals from carrying out a plan.

“If jewelry stores were easy to heist, they’d be heisted everyday — but they’re not, because people understand what is there that is going to deter them from trying,” she said. “We have kids in school. I want to know what the plan is.”

The 2022 bond would have meant an annual tax increase for local homeowners with an assessed property value of $250,000, but the current proposed measure is “not estimated to increase property taxes compared to what the property owners are currently paying,” the measure’s website states.

“That is more straightforward and feels better to the pocketbook,” Friend said. “I think that is really important to make sure that people know it’s a straight tax.”

Niles-Fry doesn’t believe there was a proper analysis by the district with regard to the property tax issue.

“A lot of people have said, ‘It’s not going to raise our property taxes,’” Niles-Fry said. “Well, it’s not; it’s just going to make this investment last longer or cost us the same for a longer period of time.”