Letter to the Editor

Exorbitant spending at heart of levy request

To the Editor:

In Fiscal Year 2010, the Hudson Schools spent $61 million in Operating Expenditures with a student enrollment of 4,975, and our Board Of Education (BOE) approved a Five Year Forecast that showed the spending ballooning to $72 million in just four years with little justification – an $11 million increase. To fund this substantial and unjustified increase in spending, our BOE decided to put a 5.9-mill tax levy increase on the ballot first in May 2010, which failed, and again in November 2010, which also failed. A reduced 4.9-mill tax levy was approved by the voters in November 2011. During all the debates surrounding this episode, our BOE took draconian measures, made outrageous threats and predicted dire consequences would occur if the voters didn’t approve the original 5.9-mill tax levy increase. You will note that the dire consequences never materialized, and it took 13 years to finally reach the $72 million spending mark in 2023. 

Now in 2023, our BOE is putting a 5.5-mill tax levy increase on the November ballot, and has approved a Five Year Forecast that shows spending ballooning from $72 million in FY 2023 to $83 million in just four years with little justification – an $11 million increase while enrollment continues to decline. What we are seeing is a beginning of some of the same tactics used 13 years ago by our BOE in an attempt to scare voters into supporting their exorbitant, unjustified, and as history teaches us, unnecessary spending plan. Vote NO on Issue 9!  

Jeff Keil

Edgeview Drive ∞