YOUNGSTOWN — A push by the Youngstown City Schools CEO to get a levy renewal on the November ballot has raised some school board concerns.
Youngstown City Schools CEO Justin Jennings wrote a letter to the board asking members to place a $5 million renewal levy on the ballot for November. One of the remaining powers of the board in the HB 70/Youngstown Plan-era is to approve tax levies.
“While HB 70 grants me much authority to run the school district, the power to place a levy before voters rests solely with you, the school board,” Jennings said in his letter. “I ask that you exercise that authority.”
The current levy will expire at the end of the year. The deadline to put the levy on the ballot to the Mahoning County Board of Elections is on Aug. 5.
“This is funding that is critical to academics as well as to sustain the other programming that we offer,” Jennings said in the letter.
But Brenda Kimble, president of the Youngstown School Board, said the letter did not address why the money is needed and how it will be used if the levy passes.
“He needs to be able to explain to the community his plan of how he’s going to right-side the district, and he has not done that yet,” Kimble said, noting since it is a renewal levy, it won’t require taxpayers to spend more. Still, the board is asking for more information from Jennings before making a decision, she said.
The district has a $123 million budget for the 2020 fiscal year. The school district’s current five-year forecast shows a deficit by fiscal year 2024. If the levy gets on the ballot and then is approved, the deficit is projected to be about $29.5 million. If it does not get on the ballot or if it loses, the deficit could be about $48 million.
“We are not going to get to that,” said Denise Dick, director of communications and public relations for YCSD. She said Jennings plans to announce cuts within the district, but it is not known when those plans will be announced.
The levy has been previously approved by voters in 2008, 2012 and 2015.
In 2015, House Bill 70 was passed to create an Academic Distress Commission and the CEO role to replace the school board. Mayor Jamael Tito Brown could appoint a new school board if the state performance markers are not met within four years under HB 70. In November 2019, the school board sued Brown to delay the appointment of a new school board.
In May, the Ohio Supreme Court denied the school board’s appeal of HB 70. Two bipartisan bills, SB 89 and HB 154, are currently pending that could abolish HB 70. Youngstown City Schools remain under state control for the 2020-2021 school year.
However, a decision by the 10th Ohio District Court of Appeals in June 2018 says that the law does not usurp all of the school board’s authority, specifically allowing the board to place tax levies on the ballot.
“I understand that HB 70 is a controversial issue, but please, don’t let the politics stand in the way of what’s best for our scholars,” Jennings said in the letter. “At least allow the voters — the same voters whom you represent … to decide.”
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