Decision 2011: Election delivers financial blow

Voters deny district’s $998,000 levy

On May 3, Great Falls voters weighed in on a $998,000 mill levy, and for the Great Falls Public School District the result was far from desirable.

The high school and elementary levies both failed by a margin of more than 1,500 votes. 

According to the Cascade County Elections Office, of the 25,000 ballots sent out to registered voters, 12,600 of them had been received by mid-Tuesday morning. All additional ballots were dropped off at the election office or cast on Tuesday at the Montana Expo Park.

After hearing the result, CMR Principal Dick Kloppel reacted by saying, “I am disappointed and somewhat saddened by the results. The general palpable atmosphere in the community was negative.”

 “There is the perception out there that the district has fat, and the bottom line is that the levy was going to support vital organs,” he said. “When the levy is needed to hire English teachers, science teachers, literacy teachers—those are all vital organs.”

Aside from the sheer numbers and the new reality of a failed levy, Kloppel said he is disturbed by voter attitude.

“More than one half of the voters say they support education, but in actuality they really don’t,” Kloppel said.

Kloppel said that in years past the district has levied funds and in the spirit of fiscal responsibility only used part of the funding.

“A few years ago we levied 19 mills and only used five of them. That ends up coming back to haunt us because our budget is based on what we use,” he said. “Had we used more, we would have more budget to work with. I guess it shows you that our frugality has even caused us to take a hit.”

Reflecting on the new reality of two failed levies, Kloppel is thoughtful.

“I don’t understand the perception that our district doesn’t use money wisely.”

School board members chosen

Great Falls voters denied the high school and elementary levies which together amounted to $998,000 on May 3, and also elected four new trustess to the school board. The voters turned down the elementary levy by 9474-7985, and the  high school levy by 9500-7993.

Mary Moe, Jan Cahill, and Bob Moretti were elected to the three four-year terms, and Johnny Walker was elected to the one-year term. Somewhat ironically, each of the trustees elected Tuesday supported the mill levy.

All candidates had the chance to interact with the public at a student-led forum April 19 at Cameron Auditorium on the Benefis campus. The American Association of University Women sponsered the event, at which student journalists from Great Falls High and CMR questioned the candidates.

For more election-related coverage, see page 6 of the May 5 issue.

Juniors awarded for departmental work

The “Outstanding Junior Awards” were handed out at an early morning breakfast April 19 in the CMR cafeteria. Juniors, parents and teachers from C.M. Russell High School and Great Falls High School gathered for the annual ceremony.

Each year, the high schools in Great Falls honor juniors who perform exceptionally well in various departments in the buildings.  The awards for 2010-2011 were given to:

Christina Green – Art

Beau Bridgeman – Business

Marquis Archuleta – Drama

Darby Lacey – English

Ali Coster – Family and Consumer Science

Mira Rumpel – World Language

Jordan Otis – Health Enhancement

Derik Powell – Industrial Technology

Katie Hodges – Journalism

Tasha Heryla – Math

Kelsey Smith – Med Prep

Keeli Telleen – Music

Dalton Albers – Science

Rachel Solomon – Social Studies

Hard winter training yields spring track benefits for Rayl

For many athletes, it normally takes two or three seasons of hard work to even think about placing at state, but this was not the case for runner Patrick Rayl.

Rayl, a sophomore, took fifth in state in the two mile last year, and is currently working hard to maintain his winning streak.

Rayl, who also runs the one-mile, said he has been “preparing to work hard to get to state.”

During a long Montana winter, however, this isn’t easy. Rayl has been preparing by running on the stairs and by running in the cold, but he won’t run if it is too snowy out.

“If it’s really cold out, I just work on endurance,” Rayl said. “It seems harder to breathe.”

But track coach Doug Darko thinks that this will end up paying off for Rayl in the end, and he has even made a bet with Rayl to inspire him to a win.

“If he wins the state meet, Coach Darko will shave his head,” Darko said.  “It would be well worth it.”

Darko recognizes the work Rayl has put in over the winter.

“He’s trained pretty hard all winter long,” Darko said. “He’s quite a ways ahead of where he was last year.”

Along with looking for a time improvement, Darko hopes Rayl makes all-state, or places in the top six.

Rayl is simply proud of how far he has come.

“It makes me feel like I worked really hard to get to where I am.”

CMR building in need of some tender loving care

The 46-year-old CMR building needs some TLC.

You walk on my floors. You walk through my doors. You slam my lockers. And I am getting older.

Although I am not as old as my counterpart across the river, at 46 I am starting to feel my age and am beginning to need more and more TLC.

Luckily, however, building technicians and administrators are dedicated to keeping me in good shape.

“You maintain the bricks and mortar,” CMR principal Dick Kloppel said.

However, the building is starting to require more attention than that.

The list of upgrades the building needs is a lengthy one. The pillars that support the school are sinking into the apron. The apron itself is cracking. The black plastic underneath the windows is also cracking, leaking water into the building. About 600 lockers are starting to break, and components of the heating system need to be fixed badly.

Ceiling tiles and heating components are a major concern. Many of the ceiling tiles need replacement, but at approximately $6 a tile, replacement doesn’t look like an option coming up any time soon.

“The cost of doing that alone will be incredible,” Kloppel said.

 Heating mixers for the building, which control how hot or cold each room gets, also need to be replaced. Kloppel used two of the foreign language rooms as an example, where the German room tips the thermometer at around 52 degrees, but across the hall a Spanish room has all of its windows open.

“If you don’t maintain it, then you end up having to replace [it],” Kloppel said.

One of the more pressing issues outside the building is the south apron, which is cracking. At one spot, daylight can be seen though the crack, and Kloppel said that during evacuations, when many students walk on the apron at once, it is possible to see the apron moving.

“Obviously, the integrity of the south apron is an issue,” Kloppel said.

Also along the south apron are the railing slabs. Kloppel originally thought that the 400-lb slabs were held on by rusty bolts, but on further research discovered that they were connected to the building with thick pieces of rebar.

“Those things aren’t going anywhere,” Kloppel said.

Head building technician Ken Cartwright is more concerned about a different sort of issue along the south apron: the pigeons and the pigeon poop.

“The quality of air coming in is very important,” Cartwright said. “It’s not really been taken care of.”

Cartwright, who has been working in the building since 1979, has seen major changes to the building, including renovations to the fieldhouse, which added locker rooms, health rooms, and art rooms to the building.

“In 1997 we had a big addition in the gym,” Cartwright said. “There’s been a lot.”

Although different issues crop up every year, Cartwright recognizes that the district tries to allot money to the school.

“You never know what’s going to come up,” Cartwright said. “Every year they [the district] come up with something to help us.”

Another project that needs to be accomplished is a new floor for the stage.

“The stage needs a new floor,” Kloppel said. “That’s been on the drawing board for some time.”

Kloppel is not the only person in the building hoping for a new stage. Stagecraft and video production teacher Tom Spencer, who works with the stage on a daily basis, would also be happy with a new stage floor.

“This is the original stage floor,” Spencer said. “Stage floors receive such wear that they are made to be changed out every year.”

Due to the number of screws and nails put into the stage every year, there are quite a few holes in the stage floor.

“It makes it very scarred,” Spencer said.

Spencer hopes to eventually put in a floor made up of a composite wood panel system so that sections of the floor could be traded out and refurbished as needed. Currently, custodians give the floor a shiny finish every summer, but that presents its own challenges to actors.

“It looks like you’re yellow from the knees down,” Spencer said. “One of the first things we do is get the floor dirty every fall.”           

Spencer, who has been teaching at the school since 1977, has seen many changes in Bill Will hall, from the addition of the drama room to changing the drapes in the theater from a “hideous gold” to the current black and red.

“They have already done a lot of the things that need to be done,” Spencer said.

Kloppel agrees, especially when it comes to technological updates around the school. This can mean anything from adding a projector to the fieldhouse to adding computers.

“We went from one not networked lab to 19 labs with internet access,” Kloppel said.

Most of the updates have focused on education, such as adding LCD projectors and Smart Boards in many classrooms.

“Maintaining the instructional component is key.”

Mill levy passes, relief hits classrooms

The Wednesday morning after the mill levy vote brought more than just the usual orange juice and breakfast cereal routine for many teachers, including stagecraft and video production teacher Tom Spencer.

For Spencer, the morning brought a sense of relief after realizing that the $647,926.04 high school levy had passed, giving many departments, including drama, the hope that they needed. However, Spencer acknowledges that there are still some monetary issues to be worked out.

“There’s still issues,” Spencer said. “So I’m not totally relieved.”

Spencer said that he is still waiting to see where he goes from the passing of the mill levy, depending on where the money ends up.

“It’s not on my hands, [it’s] not in my control,” he said.

Despite not knowing where the money from the levy will go, Spencer said that the election showed the community’s willingness to extend itself to support education.

“People kept telling me it would fail, but it passed,” Spencer said.

Another teacher who agrees that the passing of the mill levy shows the support of the community is art teacher Tess Jacobs.

“It tells me the community supports our programs,” Jacobs said. “I always expect it to pass.”

However, Jacobs doesn’t know if any of the mill levy money will make it into her classroom.

“I don’t see any of the funds coming into my classroom,” Jacobs said, adding that she expected the money to go to A.P. classes, but what was good for one program in the school was good for the entire school.

“It would depend on how it is spent,” Jacobs said.

However, there won’t be much “spending” of the mill levy money, as all the money from the will be used to maintain existing programs, according to principal Dick Kloppel.

“We’re only going to maintain programs,” Kloppel said, explaining that because of only maintaining programs, the school would not have to cut as many programs.

Despite this, the mill levy is not a guaranteed problem-solver for all the school’s monetary ills. Although the levy saved programs such as drama, other programs will be changed, such as math and science. In the district, one math teacher and two science teachers are retiring this year, and they will not be replaced, Kloppel said, also

adding that because they are not rehiring for those positions, they will not have to let any other teachers go.

“If the levy hadn’t passed, we would have had to make some really big cuts,” Kloppel said. “[However] when you’re cutting math classes, science classes, and counselors, you’re cutting vital organs.”

“Folks are accepting them because we have no other choice,” Kloppel said. “We know it’s not the right thing for [the] kids, but we really don’t have a choice.”

The school district is not necessarily at fault for the need to make cuts in the academic programs. According to Kloppel the state sets a cap for the amount of money a school district can have depending on how many students are in the district.

“The community voted on a very small mill levy, right to the cap,” Kloppel said. “We need more than the state says we do. School funding is so incredibly complex.”

In the end, what was most important was the community’s support of the schools.

“I think the community came together pretty well on this one,” Spencer said.



CMR journalists receive online training in Reno

Stampede editor in chief Tim Seery joined Katie Hodges and Josh Philyaw at the Reynolds School of Journalism at the University of Nevado in Reno, Nevada June 26-July 1 to learn skills needed to cover Rustler news online.