LORAIN – Lorain Schools will be asking residents in November to pass a levy in hopes of keeping the district out of the red, but a decision wasn’t reached during a special school board meeting Monday night about what kind of levy.

District Treasurer Dale Weber laid out a couple of different options for the school board, including an emergency operating levy that would generate a fixed sum of money regardless of property value fluctuations. A second option would be a current expense levy for a certain number of mills during a certain period of time.

By the end of 2010, the district will be nearly $200,000 in the red, and by the end of 2011 the deficit will run $9.39 million, Weber said.

When asked, Weber told board member Raul Ramos the district’s 787 full-time employees’ salaries and benefits comprise approximately 70 percent of the budget.

If a 5.9-mill levy passed, the district would stay in the black through the end of 2010, but would be $3.6 million in the red by 2011 and would be $22.8 million in the negative by the end of 2013, Weber said.

Superintendent Cheryl Atkinson said after the meeting she’s confident a levy sufficient to keep the financially strapped district operating will pass.

“I think the chances of it passing are good,” Atkinson said. “This community has shown me they care about a quality education and they’ve been supportive and I believe they will continue to be.”

Resident George Koury, 59, quoted a newspaper article claiming Lorain residents spend $2,879 per student compared with other communities that pay as much as $8,000 per student. Only four of the 97 districts spent less on its students than Lorain. Koury acknowledged the figures didn’t include state or federal money a district may be receiving – the figures were just what local residents were paying via levies and taxes, he said.

Koury also quoted the article, which had data from 97 Northeast Ohio school districts, which claimed 43 percent of students in Lorain entering kindergarten needed intensive instruction to help them get ready to read – the highest percentage.

“If we’re going to compete and provide the best educational program,” Koury said, “… we as a public are going to have to say, ‘Wow. We’re last? Less than East Cleveland? Less than Cleveland? Less than everyone?’ ”

Resident Rhoda Lee, 74, told the board the sooner they decide what kind of levy and for how much and let the public know, the better.

“We need to decide now what millage so we can get the word out to the community,” Lee said. “Sacrifices will be made. … I’m sure people will sacrifice and we’ll pass the levy.”

An attempt in November 2008 to pass a 4.9-mill levy failed by 52 votes. The levy committee has filed a lawsuit seeking permission to count 172 provisional ballots from that election hoping enough of them could reverse that levy’s failure.

Board member Jim Smith urged making more effort to get more of the 500 students who’ve left the district during the past decade to return.

“We can’t put all our financial problems on the backs of taxpayers,” Smith said. “We have to look at the students and parents as customers.”

Board President Cynthia Miller said more needs to be done not just to get students to return to the district, but to keep them here by fully restoring programs that have been cut.

“We have to be able to do more with less,” Miller said.

The board voted in the spring to put a $5 million, 10-year levy on the ballot, but later pulled the issue so it wouldn’t compete with the city’s income tax renewal issue.

The board will meet again at 6:30 p.m. Wednesday to further discuss levy options for the Nov. 3 general election.

Contact Alicia Castelli at 329-7144 or acastelli@chroniclet.com.

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