1. What are the facilities needs facing the Fennimore School District?

A facility study commissioned by the Board of Education last school year, and completed by Performance Services, Inc. identified a number of facility challenges. Essential, large-scale maintenance is needed, including, but not limited to:

• Repair and replace roofs at the elementary and middle/high school.

• Repair and update original playground equipment for ADA accessibility and increased safety.

• Update elementary, lower-level bathrooms to be ADA compliant and have a shower.

• Repair elementary elevator.

• Replace and repair windows, lights, bell system and ceiling tiles to improve energy efficiency.

• Replace worn interior finishes.

• Replace poles and lights on the football and baseball fields that are deemed unsafe.

• Replace baseball field fencing.

• Additional air conditioning equipment in the elementary and middle/high school

• Update and renovation of some classrooms and learning spaces at all schools:

  • Occupational/Physical Therapy room at Elementary school.

  • Build an Ag/Tech Ed addition to better support the agricultural, automotive, welding, and woods courses to allow for increased safety and improved ventilation

  • Create an all purpose room at the Middle/High School.

  • Create additional classrooms at Middle/High School. 

2. Why does the District need a referendum to pay for large-scale repairs and maintenance?

• It is typical in school districts, when large-scale projects are too costly for the District to pay out of annual operating funds, that they seek a capital referendum. 

• Boards of Education must ask taxpayers to borrow money for such repairs and replacements.

• An approved capital referendum is the only way for the District to borrow enough money to pay for the projects. The term of the borrowing would be a maximum of 20 years.

3. Why is there no projected school tax impact of the referendum?

While the proposed cost for all projects is $17 million, the Board of Education and administration anticipated large-scale repairs were essential. Therefore the District fiscally prepared for this referendum to have minimal impact on the taxpayers. If voters approve the referendum, the school portion of the tax mill rate is not projected to increase over its current level. (Other factors outside of the district’s control may impact individual property owners.) 

Here’s what’s been done:

• The District’s portion of the school tax mill rate has declined 19% over the last six years. 

• In addition, the District has pre-paid debt over the past three years to save interest costs of $675,000. Our District will be debt-free in 2024. 

These actions reduce the projected property tax impact of the referendum proposal. 

4. What are the benefits of the proposed repairs/renovations at the Elementary School?

The elementary school has several critical issues that need to be addressed for safety, accessibility, and adequate learning spaces:

Safety: 

• Portions of the playground are closed due to unsafe conditions of the equipment and the equipment needs to be replaced. 

• The bell and clock system will be replaced.

• Repair roof drainage systems.

 Accessibility: 
So that all students, staff, and visitors with mobility issues can use our school facilities, the following Americans with Disability (ADA) compliant improvements are needed:

• Create accessible bathrooms and shower on the lower level.

• Repair the elementary elevator for people with mobility limitations.

• Replace the playground equipment and its base to provide an accessible space for all children to play and socialize.

Learning spaces:  

• Occupational Therapy/Physical Therapy room:

Renovating the old locker rooms into much needed learning space for fine and gross motor educational programming for students with these needs, and creating ADA accessible bathroom and shower (also listed above).

Interior updates:

• Updating the interior lights, windows & ceiling tiles will improve energy efficiency and provide a healthier educational environment.

• Air conditioning is proposed for some sections of the building that are used heavily for summer programming.

5. How will the proposed projects at the Middle/High School benefit our students and community?

Infrastructure and safety:

• Remove and  replace leaking roof systems.

The long-term solution is to remove asbestos at the Middle/High School, (completed when students and staff are not present).

• Install back-up generators.

Provide a back-up system of power for technology, kitchen refrigeration, and safety during emergencies and outages.

• Replace the mercury lighting/wood poles at the football/baseball field.

• Replace baseball fencing and backstop.

• Air conditioning is proposed for some sections of the building that are used heavily for summer programming and performances year-round.

Learning spaces:

Adding much needed classroom space so students have adequate space to learn. Remodeling the building will add four additional classrooms and three small group instruction rooms.

• Build a tech ed addition to better support the agricultural, automotive, welding and woods courses.

• Renovate the current tech ed shop and classroom into a weight room and all purpose room for large group instruction; lab and hands-on curriculum

  and instruction; co-curricular and athletic practice area. 

• Renovate the current weight lifting room into classrooms.

• Renovate the current wrestling room into classrooms.

6. What are the benefits of having the Ag and Tech Ed instructional areas in one location?

The proposal updates the tech ed/agriculture spaces for the most up-to-date instructional space and equipment, increased safety, and ventilation. Locating them near each other increases supervision, and facilitates more efficient use of staff and resources. 

7. What are the benefits of having the weight room and all purpose room in one location? 

The all purpose room will be used throughout the day for instruction and large group projects across subject areas. It is connected to the weight room to increase student participation and supervision.

8. When will the referendum plan go to voters?

The referendum proposal will be on the Tuesday, April 2nd Spring Election ballot. For more information about how to cast a ballot, go here.

9. Why is it important to cast an informed vote?

Every vote is important and can contribute to the outcome of the referendum vote. Sometimes, people think that their vote won’t matter. This simply is not true. When people participate in this process, we have a much more representative result from the community’s voters. If finding time to vote is a concern for your family’s schedule, please learn about the absentee voting process at MyVote.wi.gov.

10. What happens if the referendum does not pass?

There will be necessary budget cuts to programs and services to address urgent repairs.

11. How did the School District pay back the borrowed funds borrowed early and why does the school district need more funding now?

In recent years the District has increased its levy for existing debt payments. The Board was able to do this while still holding the total mill rate steady. The funds to pay off debt early can only be allocated for that purpose. Prepaying our existing debt early ensured we would be able to address the necessary repairs and updates the aging buildings needed.  We will be debt-free in 2024. The proposed borrowing in this referendum can be added to our levy without an increase. Additionally, the prepayment has saved the taxpayers $675,000. 

Consider this example. You buy a car. In your household budget, you allocate for the car payment, plus a little extra to pay it off early. You do that because there is a teenager in the household, and you anticipate the need to purchase another car soon but you aren’t expecting a pay raise. To “make room” in your household budget for the next purchase, without a pay raise, you tighten the belt, and pay it off faster. That way, when the new car debt begins, you can swing it within your current revenue without an increase in household expenses.

12. What will happen to the mill rate if the referendum does not pass?

The Board will not be able to borrow the funds without voter approval through a referendum to complete necessary repairs and updates.  Further, a district can only ask two referendum questions in one calendar year. Because these are necessary repairs, the Board will likely revisit a second attempt at referendum question in November. If neither passes, the repairs still need to be completed, forcing the Board to make very difficult decisions on reducing programming and staffing to reallocate those funds to repairs and maintenance.  If neither passes the mill rate will drop into the mid $4 range.

13. How did the community’s response to the survey impact the final referendum proposal?

The final plan for the referendum resolution was a direct result of the survey responses.  The plans presented in the survey gave context to what could be accomplished at two price points. The price point of $17 million received the highest favor.

We highly valued the survey response and kept the price point. Equipped with the direction given by the survey, the Board and administration scrutinized all aspects of the plan so that it addresses as many of the necessary large-scale needs as possible, while reaching the price point most people favored. It is important to share that once the Board of Education decides on a dollar amount in the referendum, it cannot borrow more.

14. What is the plan for the weight room at the middle/high school?

If the referendum is approved, an option under consideration is to expand the weight room and update it at the same time as other renovations, using non-referendum dollars from the district’s building and maintenance fund. However, because there are so many high needs, expanding the weight room can only occur using district funds, if the referendum is approved for the other high need projects.

15. What will the additional classrooms be used for? If they do not have an intended use, why did they get added to the plan?

Currently, teachers share classroom spaces.  Also, paraprofessionals and the speech and language instructional staff use space converted from interior storage rooms for instruction and to meet with students.

16. What is the enrollment trend?

 In the last ten years, the lowest enrollment was 772 students in 2013-14.  We have 839 students this school year.  The increase is steady across all grade levels.  We have 113 open-enrollment students which brings in over $1,000,000 of funding per year.

17. What is a mill rate?

A mill rate is the method that tax districts use to calculate and communicate property taxes. The mill rate represents the amount of tax payable per fair market value of a property and is based on 1/1000th of a dollar. For example, in 2023/24 the mill rate for the School District of Fennimore was $8.69/$1,000. The owner of a property with a fair market value of $100,000 would pay $869 in property taxes (.0869x $100,000) to support the school district in 2024.