At a special board meeting on Monday, June 17, 2024, the Wauwatosa Board of Education unanimously approved placing two referendum questions on the November 2024 ballot, totaling $124.4M.
The questions and subsequent explanations of each request are as follows:
Shall the Wauwatosa School District, Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, be authorized to exceed the statutory revenue limit by $16,100,000 per year beginning with the 2025-2026 school year and ending with the 2028-2029 school year, for non-recurring purposes consisting of funding operational expenses, including salaries, benefits, and instructional and co-curricular programming?
This question is asking the community to provide a total of $64.4M over four years to fund district operations including salaries and benefits for staff, and instructional and co-curricular programming for students. Specifically, the funds would be used as follows:
$52.4M to cover the operational shortfall for the 2025-26, 2026-27, 2027-28 and 2028-29 school years.
$8M to increase educator compensation.
$4M for curricular materials.
The District will use its fund balance to cover the projected funding gap of $9.3M for the 2024-25 school year.
In addition to this operational question, the Board also approved a capital/facilities question, which reads:
Shall the Wauwatosa School District, Milwaukee County, Wisconsin, be authorized to issue pursuant to Chapter 67 of the Wisconsin Statutes, general obligation bonds in an amount not to exceed $60,000,000 for the public purpose of paying the costs of school building and facility projects consisting of: deferred maintenance and Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) facilities standards capital projects at Eisenhower, Madison, Roosevelt, Jefferson, and Washington Elementary Schools, and Montessori/Fisher and Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) facilities standards capital projects at Wauwatosa East and Wauwatosa West High Schools?
This question is asking the community to provide a total of $60M over 20 years, which would allow the District to address all deferred maintenance Eisenhower, Madison, Roosevelt, Jefferson, and Washington Elementary Schools and Montessori/Fisher. It would also allow the District to ensure Eisenhower, Madison, Roosevelt, Jefferson, and Washington Elementary Schools, Montessori/Fisher, and Wauwatosa East and West High Schools meet Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) facilities standards. These projects are specifically identified in this document.
A recording of the special board meeting can be found on the Wauwatosa School District YouTube channel within 48 hours of the meeting’s conclusion.
A communications campaign will be launched in the near future to ensure all voters are informed about these questions ahead of the vote on November 5, 2024. In the meantime, community members are encouraged to review information and data provided by the District on the Tosa 2075 web page
.