Thank You Lake Chelan Community

I would like to thank the entire community of Chelan for the resounding defeat of the Lake Chelan School District bond issue before the voters on April 23, 2019.

This massive and far reaching bond issue was simply not needed. The community fully understood this by researching the facts regarding the lack of enrollment growth in the past 21 years to justify a new building and campus ($59M). As many concluded, there would be additional revenue required to maintain, operate, and staff another school site if this bond issue would have been successful. This needed revenue would come from new and additional taxes to the local community.

Furthermore, the decisions to ask the community for nearly $2.5M to improve the parking lot at the football field, and another nearly $2.25M for a synthetic turf field were uncalled for and unjustified. Again, the community understood this, and sent a clear message to the superintendent and school board.

Finally, the decision to spend $1M+ to remodel space for a new district office for the administration was a misuse of capital tax funds that the voters approved in the 2013 special election. These funds, collected through our local tax revenues, should have been used in the school buildings and facilities for the benefit of all our students. This is what the community approved the additional funds for; not new administrative offices.

Again, thank you to the entire community. Continue to stay involved; seek and demand reasonable solutions to the challenges that all schools have in the education of our students. Let us look at the needs, not the wants and excessive spending solutions, to truly solve the challenges ahead in our community and school system.

Jim Busey, Chelan