There seems to be an absence of school board election discussion, both on social media and print.

It’s always been surprising to me with the lack of journalistic investigation on key issues facing our students’ education. A few weeks ago an article appeared inside this newspaper describing a $15 million dollar budget shortfall for the West Linn-Wilsonville School District. No one seemed excited, the school board members apparently all took cover, the Press had no follow-up. I wonder if any of the parties reviewed in detail the latest annual audit report required by law and published on the district’s website.

Perhaps on page 77 they would have noticed the FTE count increasing from 825 employees in 2021 to 923 in 2024; an 11% increase while the student population decreased by 246 (9,295 in 2021 and 9,049 in 2024.

Or perhaps the board members might have read on page 39 that our district‘s future principal obligations total over $624 million over the next 25 years. That $624 million consists of $455 million in principal and $169 million in interest. Our district right now, per page 72, carries an $8,505 liability on every man, woman and child in the district. Those amounts are before we approve any more bonds!

Unfortunately that spending for educating our children by passing bonds has not shown the results we should have expected. From the Oregon Department of Education website when comparing “State grade-level expectations” between our district and Lake Oswego School District, our results are terrible. For example, grade three English Language Arts show only 55% of WLWV students meeting expectations while LOSD students are 74%. It’s the same for grade eight mathematics: 41% of WLWV students meet expectations while 62% of LOSD do. It is surprising how similar the socioeconomic data is between the districts. In fact the student/teacher ratio is 16-to-1 for both WLWV and LO.

The bottom line for School Board members is ACCOUNTABILITY both for themselves and the district administration. I have observed the WLWV School District for over 12 years. We as a school board continue to be led by an administration that has not shown the kind of results we should expect. Instead you take cover by comparing our results to the statewide average numbers. However you never dig deep enough, which is your job, to review the socio-economic comparisons. Our school-related taxes are the highest by far of any comparable entity. There are generally two reasons for this: first our tax base has far fewer commercial and industrial sources than other jurisdictions. That is not your fault. The second reason is out of control spending both short and long term. Why the increase in FTE when your student census is falling. Why build schools when during the same year you should be closing at least one. Of course the devil is in the details and that is for another article.

Mike Taylor is a West Linn resident.