The special election for whether the Mingus Union High School District’s budget override will be continued is taking place through a mail-in vote in October, and the community is encouraged to take part in the process.
The override, which has been continued since the 1980s, helps fund the school’s maintenance and operations budget. If approved, it would involve a 10% override of what the Arizona state budget allows, generating almost $800,000 in the first year it is renewed.
“The override is this traditional, long-term support for our M&O budget that the community has been behind,” Superintendent Mike Westcott said.
This year’s election, however, is not to approve an override, rather it is to support the continuation of the current seven-year override that was approved in 2017 so that the funds are not reduced next year.
If a seven-year override is not renewed in its fifth year [2021-2022], the funds will start to be phased out the last two years of the override, decreasing by a third year six, being reduced by two-thirds year seven and expiring year eight. An approval of the continuation would not mean an increase in secondary property tax rates.
It would be funded by an estimate of a 25 cent tax rate per $100 of net assessed valuation used for secondary property tax purposes, which is equal to the current secondary tax rate costs that the existing override is already generated from.
Additionally, a “no” vote would not result in an immediate decrease in taxes, as the funds won’t be completely phased out for another couple of years. The district’s M&O budget, which totals around $8 million before the override and amounts to $8.8 million with it, pays for most of the school’s day-to-day expenses within four different programs: General education, special education, career and technical education, and pupil transportation.
The money pays for staff salaries and benefits, school supplies, maintenance and repair, utilities, and support for instructional and extracurricular activities within those programs.
One of the primary things the district uses the money for is paying teachers and staff.
“What we can say with pretty high confidence is we are able to generate a very competitive pay scale for teachers and staff based on that override,” Westcott said. “And when you’re competitive in terms of compensation, you tend to attract more qualified individuals.”
Having more qualified staff, in turn, allows the school to keep class sizes smaller and offer programs like AP classes, credit recovery courses and extracurricular activities. The additional funding also allows the school to offer extracurricular activities such as art, music, theater and sports at no additional charge to students.
“We don’t want to create a roadblock for kids to participate,” Westcott said. “Not everybody is as able, financially, to fund their students for extra activities for clubs for sports. … We think that open access is public education.”
The override funds also allow the school to continue letting the public use its facilities, including the foot-ball field, track and facility rentals. Because the M&O budget pays for staff, which are essential for maintaining the facilities the public use, the district is able to keep them open to the public.
If the public were to vote against the override, Westcott said there would almost be an immediate decrease in its funds.
“We could go out again [to vote on a new override] the following year, but because the funds would begin to phase down year six, we would almost immediately have less funds to work with,” he said. “So all those things that we’re able to support with the override would potentially get less support and perhaps would have to go away.”
Some of the changes that would be made if the override continuation were to be voted down include an increase in class sizes, a limitation on bus routes and student travel for extracurricular activities, the elimination or reduction of programs like music, art, theatre and other extracurricular activities, the implementation of fees for athletics, an elimination or reduction of The Academy at Mingus, elimination or reduction of advanced placement or other elective classes, and impact to the school’s ability to hire and retain qualified employees.
Westcott said there has been some confusion in the community regarding why the district needs the override since it received around $1.7 million in Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Funds. While the ESSER funds are helpful, they are a one-time source of money for the school that will expire in 2024. Because of the temporary nature of the emergency funds, the district can’t use them for any long-term expenses like salaries, the avoidance of “pay-to-play.”
“We can make long-term investments with it [the override] but can’t do that with the ESSER funds, or the federal funds. Those are literally COVID emergency relief funds and that’s all,” he said.
The override continuation election will be mail-in ballot only. The election will take place Nov. 2, 2021 and the last day to register is Oct. 4. Early voting will begin Oct. 5. For more information about the override election, visit mingusunion.com or call the district office at 634-8901
