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Tuesday Is Bond Election Day For Andover Public Schools

Andover Public Schools

Voters in the Andover Public School District will have an opportunity to decide two bond proposals on Tuesday.

The first proposition includes nine projects at a cost of about $169 million.

If approved, two new schools would be built, storm shelters would be added to six schools and all school entrances would get security upgrades.

Superintendent Greg Rasmussen says taxpayers won’t see an increase in the tax rate, but would pay an additional 17 years of taxes if this bond issue is approved.

"Our current bond issues are all paid off in three years so the Board of Education felt like this was a great time to look into the future and expand because we are able to piggyback on old bonds without increasing taxes to a certain degree," Rasmussen says.

Rasmussen says all of the district’s current bond debt will be paid off in September 2019. There is about $13 million remaining of the current bond debt.

If the bond issue passes, the issue will refinance the remaining three years of debt, add the remaining cost and stretch it out for 17 years. This bond issue will keep the bond and interest mill levy tax rate the same at 26 mills.

"The important thing to the Board of Education though was that they didn’t increase the amount they pay this year versus next year versus the year after and that they could keep that on a level playing field," Rasmussen says.

If Proposition 1 does not pass, district taxpayers would see a decrease in taxes beginning in the 2019-20 school year.

Proposition 2 includes building a district swimming pool and a career studies center, as well as adding artificial turf to some athletic fields.

This bond issue would cost about $20 million, and there would be a 2.3 mill tax increase if approved. That means the owner of a home valued at $100,000 would pay an extra $26 per year.

There are about 5800 students in Andover schools.

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Follow Deborah Shaar on Twitter @deborahshaar

 
To contact KMUW News or to send in a news tip, reach us at news@kmuw.org.

 

Deborah joined the news team at KMUW in September 2014 as a news reporter. She spent more than a dozen years working in news at both public and commercial radio and television stations in Ohio, West Virginia and Detroit, Michigan. Before relocating to Wichita in 2013, Deborah taught news and broadcasting classes at Tarrant County College in the Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas area.