Superintendent Andy Vollmuth presented the district’s plan for informing the community about its operating levy in the coming weeks. If you are willing to listen with an open mind, we hope you take advantage of the opportunity to learn about the district’s request of its taxpayers.
The New Prague Area School District is one of 42 of Minnesota’s 331 – almost 13% – school districts asking taxpayers to approve extensions or increases to operating levies. Twenty school districts are asking for voters to approve bond referenda for capital projects. New Prague is only asking for an increase to its operating levy. It’s the third time the district has requested an increase since 2022, the last one coming up 37 votes short in 2023.
This time, the district is asking for support to approve an increase to the current operating levy of $510 per pupil for 10 years. Currently, the New Prague Area Schools receive $246.70 per student in operating levy funding. If approved, the operating levy will result in an additional $2 million dollars per year to the school district’s operating budget starting in 2026- 2027. If the operating levy is approved, the property tax impact on a home valued at $400,000 – an amount considered average in the school district – will be approximately $20 per month, an amount the board sought to maintain hoping to minimize the impact on property taxpayers.
To the voters of the district, this isn‘t an endorsement or call to reject the district’s request. The district will begin its information campaign after school starts. Let your individual situation guide your vote. But before you make your decision, please, make sure you have accurate information. Don’t base your vote solely on what you see on social media unless you’ve had the accuracy of the information independently confirmed. It’s too easy for people to post misinformation or half-truths on social media.
Hopefully, people will listen to the school district’s presentations on why it needs the levy increase. Ask challenging questions. If the answer is unclear, ask for clarification. The district is asking for something very valuable so asking for complete answers to fair questions is reasonable.
The district says over 82% of what it spends goes to employee salaries and benefits. Depending on contract settlements with its unions, the district’s salaries increased from $30.58 million in its 2024-2025 projected actual budget to $30.841 million in its 2025-2026 preliminary budget the board OK’d in June. Employee benefits increased from $11.2 million in 2024-2025 to $11.34 million in 2025-2026, depending on the outcome of a contract settlement. The amount the district plans to spend on site administration is expected to increase from $1.45 million to $1.478 million in 2025- 2026. The cost of district administration is expected to increase from $506,701 to $516,982.
With over $42 million into salaries and benefits, the district puts most of the money it spends into classrooms. Almost 43% of what it spends goes to regular instruction with another 6.18% for instructional support. Less than 4% – 3.89% to be exact – goes to site and district administration. The district has blended positions to save money within the past year. There’s a story about it in this week’s print edition.
And in case you think New Prague Area School District spends too much money on what ought to be formally labeled as co-curricular activities (they still call it extracurricular activities), it amounts to 3.76% of the budget. Keeping students active and engaged is a wise investment.
The point of this numbers salad is there’s plenty to know about what the district spends taxpayer dollars on. Some of it is mandated by the state but left to be funded locally. For example, the new Paid Family Leave Act – effective Jan. 1, 2026 adds $83,677 in unfunded costs to the district’s budget. In short, the district is seeking additional funding because the 2.74% increase in the basic formula doesn’t keep pace with the rising costs of running a school district. The school board has already cut almost $7 million from the growth of its general fund budget in the past few years.
If voters again decline to support the district’s request for additional local funding, you can expect discussions to once again turn to reducing the budget. With the overwhelming percentage of the budget allocated toward instruction and transportation, those are the areas where the greatest impact of reduced spending will be felt. As was noted during last week’s board meeting, some people feel that’s a threat. People are inclined to vote for things they believe benefits them.
But a threat is only a threat if it’s not enacted.