Discoveries

Columbus Public Schools has been working on three distinct projects across the community. The Kramer Early Childhood Center, Community Town Hall Meetings, and the Columbus Plan in the Legislature. Below is an update to all three of these projects to keep you informed.

Over the past two months, construction outside has really taken off. Now that we have materials such as steel and roofing supplies in, we can move forward. What you couldn’t see was the demolition and rebuilding of the interior. Since September, the remainder of the building that was left standing was gutted completely. Many walls, doorways, HVAC were either created, demolished, or redone. The old cafeteria is now framed out for future use of the preschool, many doorways were created and opened up, and all electrical and plumbing was taken out and rebuilt.

The exterior progress has been easier to see. By using Insulated Concrete Framing we were able to get exterior walls put up in a hurry. Those walls will have a brick exterior. Right now they are putting in the steel interior structure to support the ceiling in the new addition. The target for completion is December of 2022 if everything stays on schedule. Our maintenance and facility guys have been doing a lot of demolition both inside and outside as well as pouring the concrete pillars.

Columbus Funding Plan

Since late June of 2021, CPS Director of Finance and Human Resources Chip Kay and I have been working with Senator Lynne Walz, Chairwoman of the Education Committee on a new school funding proposal that would update the TEEOSA formula used to fund Public Schools in Nebraska.

On January 7, 2022 Senator Walz and Senator Brett Lindstrom, Vice Chairman of the Revenue Committee introduced a power package of bills, LB890 (Walz) and LB891 (Lindstrom), that offer a transformational vision for education funding. Collaboration has been key in developing these bills and is a culmination of over six months of collaborative conversations with stakeholders both in and outside of education, including 42 senators, 10 policy groups and the vast majority of the school districts from across the state.

What are the key components and what does this mean for you?

• $715 million in property tax savings based on the school fiscal 2021-2022 data
• Guaranteed property tax relief through lower tax levies with no new taxes nor tax increases
• Eliminates the burden of claiming your property tax credit on your income tax return
• All school districts receive Educational Stabilization Base Aid
• All school districts receive 20% allocated income tax. Keeping local dollars local!
• Lowers the local effort rate to 75¢
• Increases the number of equalized school districts from 87 to an estimated 149 statewide
• Maintains existing school spending controls that have kept the 11-year average statewide operations spending growth to 3.0% while student enrollment simultaneously grew by 8.6%
• Provides for a designated Education Trust Fund to ensure sustainable funds into the future

In summary, in Columbus, the increase in sales and income tax as well as equalization dollars would decrease school property taxes in Columbus by almost 30 percent. The school general fund tax levy for CPS would move from .99 cents to .63 cents.

The hearing is scheduled for January 25th. This would be the first time the Nebraska State Legislature would make funding for schools an estimated 50/50 split between local and state resources.

Community Townhall Meetings

The district has started to have conversations with the community in regards to our student growth and having the facilities to accommodate the number of students we have increased since 2016. Since the time of our last bond election, CPS had increased their student enrollment by 400 students. That is roughly 31 students per grade level. We are growing faster than the student enrollment projections that were done in 2013. Projections are based upon housing, apartment, and duplex permits issued in the city. Prior to 2013 very few permits were issued. Since 2016 there have been over 703 permits issued for new construction or renovation within city limits.

The City of Columbus just finished a housing and population study in November.

Some statistics from that study include:

• Columbus grew in population by 2,000 from 2010-2020.
• Fremont and Norfolk both had around a 750 increase. Meanwhile, North Platte saw a decrease in population of about 1,300.
• Construction of homes has seen a greater increase with over 100 units built in 2019 and 2020.
• The most activity was 351 units - 277 were multi-family homes.
• The study noted around 2,000 job openings are available today. If Columbus filled one-third of those jobs, there would be nearly 670 units to be built to meet the need.

According to our enrollment projections done in 2013, we have surpassed the number of elementary students anticipated in our schools. In fact, we were not supposed to reach our current number of just over 1,600 students until 2027. Our overall enrollment of 4,059 has surpassed our projected number of 4,010 for the year 2028. This is a great problem, but also creates many challenges for our facilities. Now is the time to have these discussions. If everything goes as planned through our community and staff conversations, we could be looking at a potential bond issue in November of this year.

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Things run a bit differently at the CASSETTE House. It's not your typically classroom, according to coordinator Jackie Eickhoff.

It's a little more.

"I kinda feel like we are more like a family at the CASSETTE House," Eickhoff, who also runs Project Search, said. "Once you're here and you get to know the students, and you get to know the group, you realize that 'Oh yeah, they all get along in a different way, and they need different things,' but they all help each other, too. It's a big family, group; a big family, unit."

Join Us and Meet The Team.

Re-watch your favorite Meet The Teams or find new ones on Youtube.

Discoveries is published three times a year (one printed and two digital) by the Columbus Public Schools, P.O. Box 947, Columbus, NE 68602-0947.

If you have any special needs requests that will assist you in participating in services, programs and activities of the Columbus Public School District, please contact your building principal or the Superintendent of Schools.

Email: cps.pr@discoverers.org
Website: columbuspublicschools.org
Location: 2508 27th St, Columbus, NE 68601, USA
Phone: 402-563-7000
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ColumbusPublicSchools
Twitter: @DiscovererPride