HSV Taxpayers Subsidize FLSD Choice Students
Ms. [name redacted], an ardent Cobra booster, recently wrote about Fountain Lake School District “…it does not erase the fact that the school buildings that are currently there do not support the student increase in population that has been seen in the past couple of years.”
That statement sent me into the archives to see how many students FLSD has reported to the AR Dept. of Education over the past 9 years. Here are the numbers:
Fountain Lake School District Total Student Population & Number of Choice Students from 2013 to 2022
Did FLSD recruit “choice students” in 2019-‘20 and ‘21 to make it appear the district’s school population was growing rapidly, when it was actually shrinking? Superintendent Murphy used that argument to support the need for a millage increase in 2019 and again now. Student growth over the past 9 years has been a whopping 2.9% annually. Spin that!
It’s true that all property (personal, real estate, and utilities) in both Saline and Garland counties has been reappraised, mostly upward. Every time a house sells, the county involved adjusts its valuation to the selling price. Not all new residents will qualify for a freeze on their tax bills, so both FLSD and Jessieville will get their fair share. These two increasing revenue streams will flow to our schools for many years.
*“Choice Students” are pupils whose parents live and pay taxes in another school district–not FLSD–who have asked to transfer into our district. (We recognize that a small portion of these students has a parent working at the school.) The “School Choice” law dictates that each pupil’s state aid money stays with the losing district, while the receiving district must use its own money to equalize spending for all its
pupils. FLSD taxpayers must subsidize each “choice student” annually. Historically FLSD has gotten only a pittance in state aid because the Department of Education considers ours a wealthy district.
Vote NO! to FLSD Proposed Millage Increase/higher taxes on February 8!
Patty MacDonald, January 12, 2022
Questions? Please email NoFLSDmillageincrease@mail.com
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Kirk Denger
01/12/2022 — 3:54 pm
Thank you Patty, for taking your time to show the truth instead of spun fake reporting. The fountain lake student population is less than it was seven years ago. Unscrupulous ardent boosters and superintendent are not only spinning issues for profit, but setting an example for and rewarding the students to spin for profit also.
Why would anyone vote to give $40,000,000 to unscrupulous leadership?
Vote for honest Board members that truly care about the students instead.
John M Szczepaniak
01/14/2022 — 7:01 am
I think everyone should watch the January 13 edition of HSV Inside/out (on Facebook) and listen to the School Superintendents of Jesseville and Fountain Lake intereviews. As usual when it comes to pocketbook issues there is a lot of “spin” out there and not just from one side. Get their side of the story and then make your decision.
Jake Dettmering
01/19/2022 — 11:34 pm
I am disappointed about this articles baseless claim suggesting FLSD “recruited” more school choice kids to push a millage agenda. Baseless claims like this open up the opportunity for vulgar comments like the one attacking the integrity of Fountain Lake’s school leaders.
Is it possible that FL school choice enrollment increased because more local families liked the educational opportunities Fountain Lake had to offer, and found it to be a good fit for their kid(s)?
Is it possible that the FL school leaders are working to pass a millage because they truly believe that is what is best for their students, and they would like to provide them a better education, better opportunity, and better facilities.
I get there are two sides to every issue, but I hope future articles and comments can avoid the baseless, far-fetched claims and the smearing of people involved in this election process.
Lorri Street
01/20/2022 — 12:33 pm
Dear Jake…there are NO baseless, far-fetched claims or smearing going on with the NoFLSDMillageIncrease campaign. We do thorough research and we DO NOT skew the facts or minimize information such as Dr. Murphy has shown to do.
And, the organizers of this Vote NO campaign “truly believe that is what is best for”, like-minded HSV Property Owners. Future articles will continue to be published with the same truth/facts as all previous articles have been.
Jake Dettmering
01/26/2022 — 12:48 am
Suggesting the FLSD leaders are “recruiting” school choices kids to inflate the student population in order to push for a millage, is a baseless, misleading, far-fetched claim. Unless you can prove the “recruiting”, that is a comment that should not be taken seriously, although I do see it fits the anti-millage narrative—too bad It’s just not factually true.
The smearing of people was from a comment about the article. “unscrupulous ardent supporters and and superintendent”.
Unscrupulous means having or showing no moral principles; not honest or fair. I think that is very much a smear of the Fountain Lake Superintendent.
Bobby Bledsoe
01/21/2022 — 3:39 pm
Lorri Street. Re read the caption in the title of the article. This is clearly a completely baseless claim at worst, insinuation at best, that FLSD has actively recruited school choice students to pump up the schools population.
You can say all you want that the Vote No FLSD Millage campaign only publishes truth/facts but unless you have some proof that FLSD has recruited even a single student then it doesn’t make your claim true.
Dr Murphy has been completely truthful throughout the campaign. Insinuating otherwise is disingenuous and flat wrong. You don’t have to agree with the needs of the school or to support the millage increase but at least you could keep your campaign free of things you don’t know about.
Kirk Denger
01/22/2022 — 11:58 pm
Completely truthful? The promoters of the get rich quick tax increase fail to mention that the cafeteria covid seating is every other seat which means that only half of the normal student capacity is being served, that causes extraordinary seating in the gym and extraordinary lunch times to exaggerate a permanent dire need. Then tell the taxpayers they need a new cafeteria and throw in a couple of baseball fields for fun. Or fail to disclose that the student population is less now than it was 7 years ago, but all of a sudden they are in dire need of a new elementary school. Fail to disclose that FL receives more money already than 95% of all schools in Arkansas. Fail to disclose that FL has a new administration building, new Middle school building, new gymnasium, new safe room, new Cobra drive, new state of the art football field and newly completely restored elementary school.
FL with 34 mils is twice as rich as Jessieville with 38 mils. and then make it sound like they are the poorest school district because the mils are less??? Reward the students to campaign these half-truths, what does that teach, honesty? Baseless claims? Insinuations? When you see the truth, this tax increase campaign as presented is a comedy.
BE completely truthful, don’t just say it.
Bobby Bledsoe
01/23/2022 — 6:38 am
There is no better indication to the quality of a community than how well that community takes care of its school system. I have zero doubt that Dr Murphy is doing what he competently believes is best for both.
You can continue to deflect from the ongoing smear campaign with further baseless claims and insinuations. I don’t really care to continue correcting your mistakes. It’s up to the voters to discern between fact and fiction.
Lorri Street
01/22/2022 — 9:41 am
Dear Bobby…the published facts tell the truth. Simple as that!
Bobby Bledsoe
01/23/2022 — 5:47 am
I agree. We can leave it to the voters to distinguish between facts and your fiction.