PERRYSBURG, Ohio — Perrysburg is growing. The city's population has grown by over 4,500 since 2010 and Perrysburg Local Schools are seeing more students every fall.
"We've added over 900 students to our school district," Superintendent Tom Hosler said. "For perspective, that's the size of the entire Ottawa Hills school district we've added in the last 11 years."
In fact, Hosler said it's gotten so packed, some classes across the district are now taught in portables in the yard next to the school because there's simply not enough space.
That's why the Perrysburg Board of Education voted Tuesday to ask voters for a 5.95-mill bond levy to pay for the $140,000,000 project to build a new elementary school and expand and upgrade the district's other buildings. The levy will be on the ballot in November.
The new grade school in the southwestern portion of the district will hold 800 students in kindergarten through fourth grade.
The district's plan also calls for:
- Upgrading and expanding Toth, Woodland and Fort Meigs elementary schools
- Adding eight classrooms at Hull Prairie Elementary School
- Upgrading and expanding Perrysburg Junior High School with 12-14 new classrooms
- Upgrading and expanding Perrysburg High School with 36-40 new classrooms
- Upgrading fine arts and athletics facilities
- Addressing deferred maintenance throughout the district
- Eliminating portable classrooms.
Hosler said there's never a good time to ask taxpayers for more money, but the district needs to expand sooner rather than later. He said the project costs, such as construction, won't get cheaper in the future either.
"So we decided that was a big factor in coming to the voters now," he said.
Hosler said if the levy doesn't pass, more creative ways to address the rising student population, such as sending students to school in shifts, might be necessary.
A levy of its size would mean someone with a $250,000 home -- a price far below the average in Perrysburg -- would be paying over $500 in additional taxes a year. Residents WTOL 11 talked to aren't eager to add on to Perrysburg's already high tax rate.
"I think they need to rethink it because the people of Perrysburg already pay enough taxes," Mona Butler, who lives in downtown Perrysburg, said. "I think what's going to happen is they're going to tax people so much that people are going to start leaving Perrysburg."
However, Hostler said the school board has applied for $40,000,000 in state funding to help foot the bill, possibly taking pressure off of taxpayers in the back half of the project.