Liberty is challenged now, but there’s a promising future
Liberty is challenged now, but there’s a promising future
EDITOR:
The Ohio Department of Education is a hard task master. When a school district is placed on fiscal emergency, the ODE takes over and says “cut, cut, cut expenses and pass a levy.” The task of the Liberty Board of Education is to effectively educate our children and not shortchange them in a fiscally responsible way, which is why the board has placed a 9.9 mill levy on the ballot as part of the fiscal recovery plan approved by the ODE. The board has made over $1 million in reductions within the past two years. This levy only keeps the district “even” after the cuts.
There’s more to this than 9.9 mills. It’s bigger than our educational support systems, or our school buildings and bigger than the voters whom we’re asking to commit limited resources. We think it’s about opportunity to recover for the first time since the early 1980s. It’s no secret we did not have economic growth like other areas in our region.
Now, something good is about to happen. Walmart is our good news and the anticipated “tipping point” that will improve Liberty’s future. New construction jobs, new retail jobs, and new support businesses will be coming to help expand our tax base. New families will surely follow and come to live in a township that provides superior services of fire, law enforcement and quality education. It’s not an if, it’s a matter of when.
As we see it, the Liberty school board is doing everything it can do to save, educate our children, and preserve our rightful control of seeing to it that our children are prepared for the future.
If Liberty voters think this is only about providing our kids with quality education, we urge them to think again. It’s also about whether Liberty thrives or just survives. We ask Liberty voters to vote as though your future depends on it ... because it does.
FRANK GORSUCH
Committee, Building a Future