Bartlesville’s school board approves $19.4 million in bond issues for an Aug. 23 ballot, with more than $6 million going to classroom instruction.
Voters will consider the two bond issues in just under 10 weeks in order to keep them from getting lost on a full November ballot and to get schools money as soon as possible.
"We're just trying to have a little bit more control over our own destiny," said soon-to-be Superintendent Chuck McCauley.
At this time a year ago, the district was told it would have a flat budget. Then, two state revenue failures happened.
"That's why that's led us to these drastic reductions that we're talking about," McCauley said. "We're having a $1.9 million reduction to our budget for 2016–17. That's definitely not something that we had planned on."
The district has cut 39 jobs, 21 of them teaching positions.
"We feel like with this bond issue it would help us in the future save 15 teaching positions," McCauley said. "Not for 2016–17, but for the 17–18 year and beyond."
About one-third of the bond issue, $6.2 million, is for operations, including classroom instruction. The rest is for building improvements and transportation.
