Residents in the Capital School District will vote on a tax referendum in April.
Capital School District officials are working to convince voters to approve a tax hike that seeks in part to pay for two new middle schools.
District superintendent Dan Shelton says the April 9, 2019 referendum is the culmination of significant strategic planning.
“One of the big overarching areas that came up regularly was how to deal with our middle schools - that middle school was really one of the areas they wanted us to focus on. Also grade-level reconfiguration,” said Shelton.
One referendum question asks for the funds needed to create two new middle schools that would house 1,600 sixth through eighth graders.
Shelton says there are two other referendum questions. One seeks additional money for capital expenses - money that would be used for other improvements around the district. The third question asks voters to approve raising taxes to pay for operating costs.
Shelton says if the capital portion of the referendum is approved - taxpayers would see what he calls “a very low increase” in property taxes - roughly $14 per year, per $100 of assessed property value.
“There’s a calculator - it’s on our website www.capital.k12.de.us/referendum that goes into much greater detail and it also has a way that each homeowner can go in and put in their property address and it will give them their assessed value,” Shelton said.
Shelton adds the operating expenses portion of the referendum would raise taxes over time - if approved.
You can read more about the upcoming referendum here.
