Palmyra-Eagle residents get enough signatures to force an advisory referendum on school district dissolution

The Palmyra-Eagle Area School Board has voted on whether the school district should dissolve.

Now residents will, too. 

That's after a petition push by residents gathered the required number of signatures to force an advisory referendum on the district's proposed dissolution.

The vote will be Nov. 5. 

Petition organizer Tara LeRoy, who has two children in the district, said state law requires at least 10% of the district voters sign the petition, or about 403. The group's goal was 450.

As of Sept. 5, they had collected about 670 signatures, LeRoy said.

The petitions were expected to be turned in to the school district Friday, Sept. 6, four days before the Sept. 10 deadline. 

LeRoy said gathering the signatures and holding an advisory referendum is important.

“I think the responsible thing to do as a community is to make sure no stone be left unturned,” she said. “That school, those kids, it’s the heartbeat of our community. We can’t sit idly by and just let that happen without it being known our thoughts as a community.”

Operational referendum failed

The Nov. 5 vote will come seven months after Palmyra-Eagle voters soundly rejected an $11.5 million operational referendum that school district officials said was needed to keep the cash-starved district afloat. 

The referendum failed by a vote of 2,276 to 1,473, or 61% to 39%. Turnout was heavy, with 77.2% of eligible voters casting ballots.  

A healthy chunk of the no votes came from the town and village of Eagle, where the count was 1,447 to 457 against, according to election results on the school district website. 

The April 2 question didn’t specifically address dissolution, but district officials had said the referendum needed to pass to keep the district operational. 

On April 8, the school board voted to consider dissolving the district. Board members affirmed that vote July 1 with a unanimous decision to order the district's dissolution. If the dissolution goes through, the district would shut down after the 2019-20 school year.

The board itself could have called for an advisory referendum, but did not. 

It's possible the signatures could be challenged, although with nearly 300 more than the required number, it would seem unlikely that enough signatures could be deemed invalid.

"I can assure you, as I collected a good chunk of those personally, that there shouldn’t be any issues," LeRoy said. 

A challenge to the petition would have to be filed within 10 days of the petition being turned in, according to state statutes.  

Residents' right

Palmyra-Eagle School Board President Scott Hoff said residents have the right to call for an election.

"It’s a completely citizen-driven effort, and the law says they can do it, and the school district, the school board, literally has nothing to do with it," Hoff said. "So, however it lands, we’ll see how it goes." 

Hoff said the cost of the election, which would be paid for by the district, is estimated to be $10,000 to $15,000. 

One way to reduce the cost of the election would be to limit the number of polling places, but Hoff said the school board will wait to make that decision. 

"We don’t want to get into a situation where on one side you’ve got people saying you need to keep all the places open or else you’re going to disenfranchise voters, and on the other side people screaming you’re spending too much tax dollars," he said.  

The results of the advisory referendum will be considered by the state School District Boundary Appeal Board, which will make the ultimate decision on dissolution. 

If Palmyra-Eagle dissolves, it would also affect surrounding districts, which would absorb students as well as potential property and debt.

More broadly, a news release from the petition group said, the dissolution would "shine a spotlight on the looming crisis of inadequate school funding across Wisconsin, and begs the question that after Palmyra-Eagle, which will be the next community that has to come together to try and save its school district?"

Contact Bob Dohr at 262-361-9140 or bob.dohr@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @BobDohr1.