PHOTO: Pagosa Springs Elementary School, summer 2023.
I can start this editorial series with a disclosure.
Actually, multiple disclosures:
1. I currently serve as a volunteer on the Board of Directors for Pagosa Peak Open School, a non-profit, tuition-free public Charter school authorized by the Archuleta School District in 2017. The school was designed to offer an educational choice to parents and students in Archuleta County, in alignment with the Colorado Charter School Act.. As a PPOS Board member, I owe a loyalty to the social, academic and financial health of the school. That’s not a difficult role to embrace, considering that my daughter Ursala and I were two of the authors of the original Charter application in 2016.
2. I currently serve as the owner and publisher of the Pagosa Daily Post, and in that role, I strive to provide thoughtful and accurate discussions and news about the politics and culture of Archuleta County.
3. I currently own property in Archuleta County, and pay annual property taxes that support various government entities, including Archuleta School District; the Town of Pagosa Springs; Pagosa Area Water and Sanitation District; the Upper San Juan Health Service District (Pagosa Medical Center and its ambulance service); the Pagosa Fire Protection District; the Upper San Juan Library District; and the Archuleta County government; among others. As a taxpayer, I have an interest in seeing that our limited public funds are used in a careful manner, to benefit the overall community… and especially, those most in need of help.
This editorial series will be an attempt to honor all three of those jobs.
As a PPOS Board member, I was invited to participate recently in a series of meetings, hosted by the Archuleta School District. At the direction of the ASD School Board, the District had hired Lynea Hansen of Denver-based Hansen Communications to lead an exploratory group, looking at the question of extending the property tax Mill Levy Override (MLO), approved by the voters in 2018 with about 61% of the electors voting ‘Yes’. Nearly a 2-to-1 margin.
That MLO tax authorized ASD to collect $1.7 million in added property taxes, to support teacher recruitment and retention; to hire ‘school resource officers’; to fund safety and security upgrades; and to fund full-day Kindergarten. (The funding was to be shared with PPOS proportionately, based on student enrollment.). The ballot measure included a seven-year ‘sunset’ — the added tax would expire in 2025.
When the State of Colorado began funding full-day Kindergarten in 2019, ASD made the decision to forego the taxes intended for that program, and began collecting only $1.5 million of the larger total approved by the voters.
As mentioned, the Mill Levy Override does not expire until 2025, but the School Board authorized a volunteer study group a couple of months ago to look at the question of how best to get the MLO renewed — assuming that it ought to be renewed.
Should ASD put the question before the voters in 2023?
One possible advantage to asking for the extension in November, 2023: if the measure should fail, ASD would still have the opportunity to go back to the voters in 2024 or 2025, for another try.
One possible disadvantage to asking for the extension in November, 2023: The MLO is a property tax, and the community has just been hit with a dramatic increase in appraised property valuations by the Archuleta County Assessor, which will result in higher property taxes for most homeowners in 2024. Maybe 2023 is the wrong year to ask for the voluntary extension of an existing property tax?
To help the study group develop a recommendation about putting the MLO extension on the 2023 ballot — or whether to wait until 2024 or 2025 — consultant Lynea Hansen enlisted the help of a couple of lawyers to write up some sample ballot language, conforming in particular to Colorado requirements around the TABOR Amendment. The TABOR (“Taxpayer Bill of Rights”) Amendment was approved by Colorado voters in 1992, and aims to limit the growth of government, especially when property values (and property taxes) increase at a faster rate than the Consumer Price Index.
TABOR also limits the ability of government agencies to create long-term debt without voter approval.
Understandably, the TABOR Amendment is not terribly popular (generally speaking) among government agencies, and many clever financial devices have been invented to try and avoid the limits imposed by the amendment.
Following the 2018 approval of ASD’s Mill Levy Override, the extra funding was used mainly to increase teacher and staff salaries.
According to ASD documents, here are some published salaries for 2015, 2021, and 2023.
As we can see, the salaries increased substantially following the 2018 MLO approval. (Salaries also increased at PPOS, although PPOS does use a salary schedule, per se, but negotiates salaries on an individual basis.)
The salary for a first-year teacher with a BA increased by almost $17,000, or by about 50%, between 2015 and 2023.
A first-year High School Principal salary increased by about $30,000, or by about 47%.
For a first-year custodian, the increase was about $14,000, or about 55%.
For a first-year bus driver, the increase was $10 per hour, or about 70%, between 2015 and 2023.
During that same period, the selling price of a single-family home in Pagosa Lakes more than doubled. The price of a condo also more than doubled. (Charts provided by Lee Riley, ISellPagosa.com)
Rental rates have seen a similar 100% increase, generally, since 2015.
We could safely say that, even with the significant additional funding provided by the Mill Levy Override, the salaries paid to ASD staff have not kept up with the increased cost of housing in Archuleta County.
With those numbers in mind, we might find the conversations that took place with consultant Lynea Hansen and the MLO advisory committee to be interesting.