Canfield voters to face 5.9-mill tax levy

Staff report

CANFIELD

In a 4-0 vote, Canfield school board members approved the second reading of a 5.9-mill, five-year additional operating levy.

The levy will now appear on the November ballot.

“We have to be able to grow as a district,” Superintendent Alex Geordan said. “We need to do this.”

The levy will go toward technology and security upgrades, additional course offerings, reducing the pay-to-participate program and expanded transportation—all of which are a necessity and not a want, Geordan said.

The levy would bring in about $3 million annually to the district. Officials would not say how much the levy would cost homeowners per $100,000 of valuation.

The last levy Canfield passed was in 2002. Additional levies in November 2010 and May 2011 failed to pass. Those 6.8-mill operating levies would have brought in $3.6 million annually to the district.

In November 2011 voters turned down a 4.9-mill operating-levy, which would have brought in about $2 million to the district.

The district decreased its spending to prove to the community additional revenue was needed by eliminating high school busing, cutting positions, adjusting school fees and adopting a new contract with staff and teachers that included a three-year salary freeze.

That freeze will be set for one more year, but Geordan said the levy revenue would not go toward salaries.

School board member Brian Kesner was not at the special meeting Thursday to vote on the levy.