In January, Portland Public Schools floated the idea of asking voters to increase the local property tax that pays for around 700 teachers, polling 400 voters to gauge their willingness.
The answer came back a resounding no.
The district quickly retrenched. Instead, voters will be asked in May to renew, but not increase, the five-year levy of $1.99 per $1,000 of assessed value, a rate in place since 2011.
The poll results were disappointing but not surprising, said several observers, including school board Chair Gary Hollands, who suggested that voters might be suffering from “tax exhaustion.”
Portland taxpayers have historically been very supportive of public schools. The last time a levy renewal was on the ballot, in 2019, it passed with the support of 77% of voters. But since then, the district has weathered COVID-era disruptions, a pronounced drop in enrollment, a bruising teacher strike and the resignation of superintendent Guadalupe Guerrero.
In the January poll, 62% of respondents said they were inclined to vote to renew a levy. That’s both a good sign for those pulling for its passage and an inclination of just how much support has eroded since 2019.
Voters are acutely aware of a host of other local and regional taxes and levies that have won approval in the past five years, some of which have been slow to yield measurable results, said Eric Fruits, an economics professor at Portland State University who has sent four children to Portland’s public schools.
“The mantra I have heard is that people don’t mind paying taxes if they feel like they are getting something out of it,” Fruits said. Portland Public Schools has touted its rebounding test scores and graduation rates as proof that things are getting better, he said, but the message is blurry, especially, Fruits said, if voters think, fairly or not, that the system has simply lowered the bar instead of raising achievement.
“People are saying, ‘We are giving enough. Now you need to show some results,’” he added.
In the poll, 50% of respondents said they thought the district was on the wrong track, versus 24% who said it was on the right track. Those who cited the wrong track told poll takers they were primarily concerned about lackluster educational outcomes despite public investment and not enough money going to classrooms.
Poll respondents also did not spare state lawmakers, with 64% of them saying the state was not adequately funding local school districts. That theme emerged as a sticking point during the November teachers’ strike, when lawmakers insisted they’d given Portland and other districts all the money they’d requested, even though the state allocations assumed far smaller cost-of-living increases than educator unions around the state have sought and won at the bargaining table.
Earlier this week, after a threatened strike was averted in the Salem-Keizer district, its school board members noted in a public letter that the state’s 2023 projections that school personnel costs would increase by 5.45% over two years has “proven wildly inaccurate.” Salem-Keizer Public Schools’ personnel costs will increase more than 14%, the letter said, adding, “Due in part to a broken and discredited method for estimating future costs, Salem-Keizer will announce the loss of hundreds of positions in the coming weeks.”
In Portland, the poll results make it plain that the school district would benefit from strong public support from educators to pass the May levy. Sixty-six percent of respondents told pollsters that they had favorable impressions of the district’s teachers, compared with just 21% who said the same about the school board.
“This is one of the common things that we all can get behind, something that both the (teachers union) and the district know needs to happen.” Hollands said. “It would be detrimental for all sides (if the levy doesn’t pass). We need each other to get this through.”
Portland Association of Teachers president Angela Bonilla said the union plans to support the levy renewal campaign, calling it “critical to getting much needed funding and support to neighborhood public schools” in a written statement to The Oregonian/OregonLive. Bonilla added that educators agree with the “community sentiment from the district’s polling that spending on students and in the classroom should be prioritized in the PPS budget.”
Some school board members had openly advocated an increased levy to help plug the $30 million budget gap that’s leading to cutbacks in school staffing and central support services.
The poll was conducted between Jan. 22 and Jan. 24 by Seattle-based Patinkin Research Strategies. The district spent $35,200 on the poll.
— Julia Silverman covers schools and education policy for The Oregonian/OregonLive. She can be reached via email at jsilverman@oregonlive.com. Follow her on X.com at @jrlsilverman.