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School Elections: Bond Proposals, School Boards on Ballots Tuesday

Posted on: Monday, 3 April 2006, 03:03 CDT

By Kim Brown and Michael Smith, Tulsa World, Okla.

Apr. 2--Area voters will decide school elections in the Glenpool, Owasso and Skiatook districts Tuesday, while Bixby residents will consider a municipal bond issue.

Owasso and Glenpool voters will decide proposed school bond issues, and Skiatook voters will decide a runoff race for the District 1 school board seat.

School bond issues require a 60 percent supermajority to pass. Both Owasso and Glenpool bond issues would not raise the tax rate, officials said.

Owasso Public Schools is putting before voters its largest school bond package to date -- a five-year, $36.25 million proposal.

It is divided into two propositions: The first calls for $35.75 million for districtwide improvements including classroom additions, construction needs and furniture for nearly all of the district's school buildings to increase student capacity, officials have said.

The second proposition calls for $500,000 for transportation.

If the bond issue passes, Owasso High School will receive more than $15 million, the district's elementary schools would get about $7 million, and the sixth- and eighth- grade centers would receive nearly $6 million in upgrades.

Owasso Superintendent Clark Ogilvie said the high school is a good example of the district's steady student population growth of about 4 percent each year. He said the high school was originally designed to hold 1,000 students, and it is already overflowing.

"We have 1,075 kids right now. In five years, we estimate we'll have 1,500 and in 10 years we'll have 2,000," Oglivie said. "We basically have to double the size of our high school."

Glenpool Public Schools will ask voters to pass a $2.1 million bond package.

The first proposal calls for about $2 million for classroom construction at the kindergarten, elementary and middle school buildings, said Glenpool Superintendent Kathy Coley.

It will also fund a remodel of bathrooms at the high school, two new driver's education vehicles, canopies at the elementary and middle schools and more.

The second proposition calls for $110,000 for new buses, Coley said.

In Skiatook, Mike Eckenfels and Susan J. Ridenour were the top two vote-getters in a February school election and will face off in a runoff election Tuesday.

At Bixby, a $20 million bond issue will be decided Tuesday. The issue that would provide wider streets, a new fire station and an enormous youth sports complex could improve the quality of life in Bixby, the state's fastest-growing city.

As chairman of Bixby's Make It Happen committee, Sean Kouplen spearheaded an effort to bring civic leaders together for a bond package.

They ranked about a dozen projects, to include water system improvements and a "super playground," among many others, for a package that includes $20 million in bonds as well as two quarter-cent sales tax propositions.

Elsewhere, elections for city and school bond issues, school board elections and mayoral races are being held in several northeastern Oklahoma communities Tuesday.

Polls are open Tuesday from 7 a.m. to 7 p.m.

In Creek County, Oilton residents will decide two separate one-cent sales tax increases on Tuesday -- one for street repairs and another for public schools.

The school tax would replace a one-penny tax that expired Dec. 31, which helped Oilton schools build an FFA show barn and make gym improvements.

The new tax would help pay to build a new elementary school, Humble said, while the city tax is dedicated to Oilton street repairs.

Stillwater has a sales tax election also, with a half-cent proposition on the ballot that would fund transportation projects.

Three City Council seats are being contested Tuesday in Muskogee, as are City Commission spots in the Payne County communities of Cushing and Yale.

In Rogers County, the Northwest Fire District -- which covers Oologah, Talala and rural areas west of Claremore -- has proposed a bond measure of $975,000.

The bond would extend the department's existing debt service to make future fire station and equipment improvements, Chief David Puckett said.

Okay Public Schools is asking voters to approve a $1.465 million bond issue to construct a seventh- and eighth-grade center to feature classrooms, a computer lab and a science lab.

A Pawhuska school bond proposes that $650,000 be approved for school improvements in the district.

School board members will be elected Tuesday in the Chouteau-Mazie, Oak Grove, Woodland and Boynton-Moton public school districts.

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Kim Brown 581-8474 kim.brown@tulsaworld.com

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Copyright (c) 2006, Tulsa World, Okla.

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Source: Tulsa World

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