Voters in the Wichita school district will decide this November whether to approve a $615 million dollar bond issue. The money would go toward heating and air-conditioning improvements across the district, new buildings and several major renovations.
With last year’s bond issue failing by about 300 votes, the district is hoping efforts to engage the public this time around will pay off.
KMUW recently spoke with Wichita Superintendent Kelly Bielefeld about the bond, asking him some of the community’s most pressing questions.
EDITOR’S NOTE: Some responses have been edited for length or clarity.
DANIEL CAUDILL: For people who maybe aren't in schools every day, or for people who haven't been in a school building in a while, what kinds of needs are you seeing in schools that could be addressed with the bond issue?
KELLY BIELEFELD: This bond issue is different than some of the ones we've had in the past. We're trying to do a lot of different things with this bond. So there's a piece of it that's about workforce development and a new FutureReady center for construction trades, (plus) CTE (career and technical education) opportunities at some of the high schools.
There's a piece of it that's about preserving historic high schools, so $20 million for East High (and) for North High. Both those buildings are over 100 years old, and have lots of needs as far as just upkeep. They're amazing buildings, great architectural symbols in our community, but they're expensive.
Updating learning environments is another piece of it. You know, a lot of our schools were built kind of in that Baby Boom generation of the ‘50s and ‘60s, and so that's been a couple years ago. And those environments weren't necessarily built square-footage-wise, ADA accessibility— You know, a number of those things weren't in place back then. So, creating better learning spaces for our kids.
And then truthfully, part of this bond issue is maximizing— creating efficiencies in our district. We're experiencing declining enrollment, as 90% of Kansas school districts are. School districts all across the nation, like us, are in a similar situation. So we want to position ourselves as best we can for 10 and 20 years down the road. These are long-term problems and opportunities, so we can take two smaller schools that are both 70-80 years old, combine those into one bigger school, create more efficiencies and create a better student experience for kids.
So it’s really putting all of those things together. Our kids have needs, our buildings have needs, and we’re trying to do multiple things at once with this bond issue. But those are the four main things we’re trying to accomplish.
CAUDILL: The district has to routinely spend quite a lot of money on the foundations at East and North. Is part of this bond also to kind of get ahead of some of (those) maintenance costs at those two schools?
BIELEFELD: Right. Yeah, it is. It’s foundation work. It's tuckpointing. You know, those are giant buildings that are all brick— essentially maintaining that outside building envelope so water doesn't get in. Those sorts of things. But truthfully, what it really is about is: we allocate about $50 million a year (for) our capital budget.
Our capital budget is capped at 8 mills for people's taxes, so we can't levy any more than what we are currently. And when we have $50 million for the entire district and 83 different buildings, if two of the buildings take up 90% of that, that doesn't leave much for everybody else. So that's part of why we put it in the bond issue.
We know there's going to be continued work needed over the next five or 10 years for North and East High, and I think that'll also allow those capital funds to be used to support all those other buildings. Deferred maintenance is a term that gets thrown around a lot. It's not really deferred maintenance. We just don't have the funds to do all the preventive stuff that we would like to do. This would only be our third bond issue in 50 years in our community, so it's not like we go to voters often for this. But that's a bit of why we feel like now is the time.
CAUDILL: It seems like the coalition for the bond issue this year is a little bit different. You have the Wichita Chamber, for example, endorsing the bond issue. You have some Republicans, like board member Diane Albert, being very vocal in their support for the bond issue. Does that coalition make you hopeful that you'll have better luck this time around?
BIELEFELD: Ultimately, from my vantage point, this is not a partisan issue, right? You know, schools and kids shouldn't be a partisan issue, but it's ignorant to think that property taxes aren't part of the conversation. They are, and I think that's somewhat where the politics comes in.
We learned a lot in 2025. We learned that we needed a more specific plan. We learned that we needed to go back out to the community and ask again. We had done some community engagement, but nothing nearly as robust as we did this time around. And we heard things like, “Instead of building so many new buildings, why don't you repurpose some of the old ones that you're closing?” Which is why we pivoted from building a new early childhood center to using OK Elementary for that early childhood center. So we really truly listened to the community.
We laid out each project specifically, and I think some of those steps have created that transparency and trust that we've needed, so that regardless of, you know — independent, Democrat, Republican — whoever you are, if you see that kids have needs, if you know that there's a strategy for the district to invest in talent development, workforce pipeline— those are things that really aren't partisan. (Things) that all Wichitans, I think, hopefully, can believe in and get behind.
CAUDILL: I wanted to give you the opportunity to respond to some common criticisms or takes I see out in the community. One that I see a lot is, “The Wichita school district has a $1 billion budget. That's plenty of money. They need to figure it out with what they have.” What's your response to that?
BIELEFELD: Yeah, it’s a good question. I'm four years into the job, and there's still days where I struggle to wrap my head around how big our district is. You know, our student population is the size of Salina, and so I don't know what Salina's budget is, but that's a big undertaking, too. And with that many numbers, it takes a lot of money.
The other piece of that billion-dollar number, you know, so much of that is restricted funds. A portion of that goes to KPERS (Kansas Public Employees Retirement System) for the pension. A portion of that goes to our self-funded health insurance. Part of that is special education. Part of that is capital outlay. When you look at all of that put together, you think, “Man, that's a lot of money.” But the actual money that we have to be able to put toward facilities is that $50 million a year that we levy from the eight mills, and that's capped. We can't go any higher than that. Honestly, all of our property tax decisions are capped, so the only way we can invest in facilities and big infrastructure projects is through bonds.
It's the same way the City of Wichita and Sedgwick County do it. They pass bonds all the time. They can pass them at the board table. They don't need to go to the voters. But bonds are not some kind of crazy tax scheme. It's something that government entities do all over. School districts are just required to go to the voters for it. That's the difference. When (the) City of Wichita builds a new fire station, they pass bonds to build that fire station, and none of us even really think about it. We don't see that as a tax increase, you know, because our taxes didn't go up necessarily. They might have, but they don't necessarily go up when those bonds are passed, and ours are the same way.
And so that budget is big, but the number of dollars that are restricted is also really big. I mean, this really is the option for infrastructure investment in a school district, is a bond issue.
CAUDILL: Another comment that I see is that the district needs to improve its outcomes before it asks for a bond. So I'm guessing by outcomes, people maybe mean things like graduation rate, test scores. Your response to that?
BIELEFELD: Yeah. Well, it's funny you phrase it that way because I do think there's even maybe a question of, what does that mean? What are the outcomes? Since I've been superintendent, we've improved on pretty much every outcome that we've set a goal toward. Graduation rate is at a record high at over 85%.
Reading scores, literacy— that's been a big, big focus for us. In ‘23, when I became superintendent, our district average was about 19% that were proficient and we're up above 30 now. Thirty is a long way from where we need to be, but we are improving outcomes. It feels like a little bit of a nebulous statement of, “Improve outcomes and then we can vote for a bond.” It’s like, well how much and to what degree? And I truly believe that some of those people that say that really never would support a bond. They just want a reason to say that they don't support what we're doing.
The reality is that we can do more than one thing at a time. We do about 50 things at a time. You've been to board meetings. We approve all sorts of things. We talk about cell phones and students, and kindergarten and pre-K, and college readiness and all these different things. So to say, “Well, do one thing and then do the other things,” that isn't really practical. We need modern learning spaces for our kids, and we need to improve outcomes.
CAUDILL: So, you mentioned property taxes, and I do feel like that's one thing that I see a lot of people who are critical of the bond talk about. The district has said that for a home worth $200,000, it'd be about a $50 a year increase.
When you look at the bond payments that are about to fall off, some people look at that as a coming tax cut. What's your response to people who say that this is actually a much larger tax increase than perhaps what the district has said?
BIELEFELD: The bonds that were passed in 2008, that happened in November of 2008, so the bonds were actually sold in, like, early 2009. They were 20-year bonds, so they will fall off after 20 years. That is true. It isn't true that we can survive as a district if we don't pass bond issues, right? That's not true. There's no district around us that doesn't have a bond levy. Almost everybody in the county is significantly higher than we are when it comes to that.
So it is true that we don't have to pass bond issues, but it really isn't practical. Like we do have to pass bond issues, and that's not something that we get to decide. That's decided in Topeka. Topeka decides how all of this works, what the mill rate caps are, all of those sorts of things, so we're just playing by the rules that we're given. If people want different rules, they need to talk to somebody other than us. But our mechanism for doing this is a bond issue that goes to the voters. That's our choice. I mean, we don't really have any other options other than that.
With the tax rate specifically, though, that is a piece of why we broke this into two questions, because there is an option on the table. If you're a homeowner that supports kids, that supports education, but you're like, “Man, I just can't afford that $50 a year or $4 a month on my $200,000 house,” then you can vote “yes” on (question) one and vote “no” on question two. So we deliberately based that decision on how to frame that on community feedback.
We heard people that came to board meetings from the podium that said, "Hey, property taxes are high. What can you do?” We have needs, and so I don't think it's the right thing to do for kids to just say, "Well, we're never going to pass a bond issue ever again,” while at the same time we need to hear from those taxpayers who said, you know, things keep going up, life is expensive. What can you guys do to help? So, question one is mill neutral. It would be flat. It wouldn't be a tax increase as far as the rate goes for anybody if that passes. So, we did really try to honor that feedback and listen to that feedback. But we are playing the hand we've been dealt, and we're using the tools that we've been afforded.
CAUDILL: When it comes to funding things in government, it comes at a cost to somebody, but you're getting something for that cost. In your view, as the superintendent, why is this investment worthy for a homeowner?
BIELEFELD: I think our community is a little bit different than a lot of our suburban neighbors, and in our suburban neighbors’ districts, there's more people that live in the community (that) have kids that are going to the schools. We have an older community. A lot of our voters, you know, maybe they went to our schools or their kids went to our schools, but maybe grandkids are going, maybe not. So the connection is not as strong necessarily between our entire community, proportion-wise, as it is in other places.
But I believe every Wichitan will be impacted if this bond were to pass. Part of what we're doing with the bond is a FutureReady Center for trades that would provide capstone programs for kids in construction science programs, in plumbing, HVAC, electrical and energy. And every Wichitan needs that, right? Like, we all need a plumber sometimes. We all need electricians. Sometimes it's hard. These are hard-to-find people. You can get on a waiting list, especially finding good ones. And so, every Wichitan, their life could be better if this passes and we train these kids to do these jobs.
The same is true of the second question, where we have investment in fire science at South High School and in police science at Northwest High School. All of us in the community need firefighters. We need police officers. Not every day, but when we need them, we want them to be there and want them to be well trained and connected to the community. Both of those areas are ones that, in working with the county and the city, we know there's lots of retirements on the horizon. There's a pipeline that needs (to be) filled, and so, you know, hopefully that's what translates for everyone in this community, regardless of how people vote.
Wichita Public Schools is really, truly trying to make our community a better place. We're trying to get kids aligned with careers that are good jobs. You know, being a firefighter is a noble job; it's a good job. Being in construction trades is a good job. We have a Future Ready Center for aviation, for healthcare, for IT (information technology). These are good jobs that support our local economy, while, at the same time, support our local citizens who need people doing these roles.
CAUDILL: In recent years, the Wichita school board has voted to close a handful of schools. There's at least two more set to close this year. Some people in the community don’t quite understand why the district is closing some schools at the same time that it's asking for a bond issue, which would involve building some new buildings at least.
Can you explain some of the strategy in that plan and how this all kind of fits together?
BIELEFELD: I appreciate the question. I was just talking to the former commissioner of KSDE (the Kansas Department of Education) this past week, and he was saying that what Wichita is trying to do is really the new model of what Kansas schools are going to be faced with. It used to be that the playbook to pass a bond was essentially, “We're growing, our student population is growing, so we need more buildings,” and that logically makes total sense. And I think that we passed a lot of bonds in Kansas over the last 75 years with that mentality.
We're facing a new reality in Kansas, I think, and so it's a combination of making sure we have the right schools in the right parts of town that are the right size. It's a combination of that, along with ensuring that investments are made that are strategic and long term.
I mentioned the Baby Boom era earlier. There was a point in time in Wichita where we had 92 elementary schools, and pretty much every square mile had an elementary school that had, you know, 400-500 kids in it. There was population density. There [were] more kids under roofs. There [were] more people living in those communities that had school-aged children, and so there was a need for that many schools.
We’re in a different era in our community where there's not a need for that many schools. We still have neighborhood schools; we still believe in neighborhood schools, but those neighborhoods now have to be bigger. The boundary has to be bigger because there's just not as many students living in that area.
All of that takes longer to explain, and it's not as intuitive as, “Bond issues are for growth.” Those older buildings that we're in, that were built in the ’50s and ’60s, really aren't designed for what learning looks like today in 2026. So, it's a combination of all of those things, but it's a little less linear than what it used to be. It's a little bit more complex.
CAUDILL: In that approach, though, with consolidating buildings, I do sometimes hear people are concerned about classroom size. Is the district able to make any sort of commitment about classroom size, or is there a target number that you're aiming for? Maybe at each school level: elementary, middle, high school?
BIELEFELD: We have board policy on guidelines, but we really have practical guidelines that we use. Mostly in the elementary world, it's 18 to 22. I think last year, over 90% of our classrooms hit that range of 18 to 22. Do we have outliers on each end? Yeah. Do we have a couple classes that are 10 or 11 kids? Yes. Do we have a couple classes that are 29? Yes. But for the most part, that's really our sweet spot.
I would love to be able to get that down even lower at the kindergarten/first (grade) level, where we know that's critically important (for) literacy. Kindergarten classrooms of 24 and 25 [are] challenging. Kindergarten is challenging in all sorts of ways. But you know, if we could do anything, I think that's what we would do (lowering Kindergarten class size).
When you get up to the high school level, it depends a little bit on the course and all of that kind of stuff, but those numbers tick up a little bit. It depends on the high school, but you know, close to 22, 23, 24 at most of our high schools. But we have more outliers. If you offer one calculus class, you might have 30 in that class.
This is another clarifier that, you know, we talk about bigger schools, so we have four-section schools. That doesn't mean bigger class sizes. That just means instead of two third-grade teachers, you have four third-grade teachers. And the reality of doing that is you can actually spread those students more evenly when you have more. If you have two (classrooms) and you only divide it by two, that becomes harder. But when you have four, you can actually spread out those students a little bit more evenly.
Valley Center just built a new elementary school. They built a five-section elementary school. Last bond, all of our elementary schools we built were four-section elementary schools. So that's kind of the tipping point of efficiency, where you can have (a) principal and assistant principal, counselor, social worker, all of that kind of stuff, fully staffed and reach those efficiency points while keeping class size relatively in that range that I talked about, right around 20.
CAUDILL: We talked a little bit about deferred maintenance, and I know you said that it's perhaps a little bit of a misnomer. Could you talk about where some of the district's maintenance costs, deferred maintenance– where that stems from, where that kind of problem comes from? And how do you assure people moving forward that the new buildings will be taken care of?
BIELEFELD: I think the term deferred maintenance implies we [had] plenty of money and we just chose not to do it. Like, at your own house, you knew you needed a new window, but you went to Tahiti instead. That really wasn't the choices we had. We had too many windows to replace and not enough money to replace them. That's what we're up against.
I saw a comment the other day about the air-conditioning, because this bond issue, one of the things we're doing is air-conditioning at all the middle school gyms and actually a high school gym that [doesn't] have air-conditioning. [The comment] was like, “we haven't even paid off the bond issue for air-conditioning, and why didn't this get done?” Well, we actually have [paid off that bond issue]. The air-conditioning bond issue was in 2000, and so if you think about that, in a lot of Wichitans’ minds, that was yesterday. But it really wasn't.
HVAC systems, they have usually a warranty life of 10 to 15 years, so it’s time. A lot of those are needing TLC now. We’ve gotten 25 years of life out of a number of those, so we’ve extended the life. We've done great work on preventative maintenance and taking care of [them] and being good stewards of [them], but they don't last forever. As those things are needing replaced, that's a bit of what takes up those capital dollars.
The other thing we prioritized as a board was secured entry points in all of our schools. We used capital dollars for that. Most of our neighbors, most Kansas communities did that through bond issues. The district I was at, when we passed a bond issue, that was part of what we did. The bond was going towards safety and security. [In Wichita,] we used capital dollars for that. So there were choices we made – I think they were the right choices – but that deferred the ability to do other things.
Again, back to the property tax caps that we have, we can't levy any more than that. The only option we had was to take money out of the general fund, which normally goes to teaching and learning, and use it for fixing buildings. We did that at the end of the ‘24-’25 school year with about $17 million to backfill some projects we needed. But ideally, that's not a good model either. We want to pay teachers more. We want to be the most competitive district in the region, and so to be able to do all the things requires more funds, which is why we're asking voters for the bond.
CAUDILL: I want to talk to you about the reality of funding large construction projects in the year 2026. Listeners may note that this bond issue is about $165 million more than last year. If this bond does not pass, what does that likely mean for future proposals?
BIELEFELD: Yeah, I think it's the reality of 2026 America, and we all are living in it, that we actually cut projects out from the last bond issue. People don't really realize that there's fewer projects and it costs more. And so I think that if this doesn't pass now, it only becomes more expensive. If we go back out to voters again, it'll probably be the same thing: fewer projects that cost more money.
We were going to rebuild Caldwell Elementary. We're not going to rebuild Caldwell Elementary in this bond. We were going to build an early childhood center. We're not going to build an early childhood center. So we took things out, but all the projections are showing things are going to be more expensive: labor, steel, diesel. That's just the reality of where we're at. So, the cheapest time to do this would be today in November of ‘26. And if voters decide that's not the right choice for us right now, we'll have to come up with another plan. But I would assume it will be in the same vein of fewer projects that cost more money.
CAUDILL: The district's last successful bond issue was 18 years ago. That's basically a whole generation of kids. If I'm a Wichita voter, why now?
BIELEFELD: Why now? Yeah, that's a good question. We've done a good job because it has been so long managing that mill rate and keeping it low, we have essentially decreased the mill rate, or it's at the lowest point it's been in 16 years. People don't necessarily feel that because the value of their house might have gone up, but that’s the reality. Our board has been pretty adamant about keeping that mill rate low. We can pass this bond issue, both questions, and still be by far the lowest mill rate in the county.
Now, if I live in Wichita, that may not mean much to me because I'm not planning to move to Andover or Derby or one of those places. But that is the reality for us: We have been really good stewards of keeping that mill rate low, of trying to balance all of the needs in the district. Improve outcomes while at the same time creating good [experiences] for kids. But now's the time. I mean, we need investment in our infrastructure. It’s not (at) no cost to the taxpayer, but what we feel is an acceptable cost to the taxpayer.
We know times are tough, but we can get a lot done [with] everybody just chipping in a little bit all across our community. The fact that we ended up having to delay [the FutureReady center for trades] two years because we got a “no” last time only put us further behind on that workforce pipeline work. If we have to go back and do this again, that would cause those kids to wait. Our kids are great kids. We have an amazing staff, amazing kids in our district, and they want these opportunities. They want opportunities to have great jobs that are going to support our community. So I think the question is to our community: Are we going to step up and provide those opportunities for our kids?
