School Board District Boundaries
Steve Joonas
April 29, 2008
Our discussion has continued about the possibility of changing the school board district selection process. If you recall, the last Board of Education passed a resolution to take it to the voters to determine if we wanted to change our current district format. Our timeline was not right and therefore the discussion has continued with our new Board.
We have been discussing this over the past couple of months and the plans are to have another resolution to take it to the voters in the near future. We would like to explain the process and the rationale for the possible resolution. There are two main reasons for this to be considered. The first reason is that the populations of districts do not meet the state requirements. They are supposed to be within 5% of each other. The second reason is that it would make it easier to find people to represent a larger area.
Currently we have six voting districts that each select one member for the Board of Education. Marge Schlabach represents the area north of Hanover, Joel Hynek the main part of the city of Hanover and Jim Kruse the south part of Hanover all the way to the middle of Barnes. Larry Nicholson is the at-large member that the entire district votes for. On the south side of the district, Todd Frye has the south part of Barnes over to highway 15 and south, Bryce Heck has the city of Linn north and Bruce Meyer the southern portion of our district south of Linn. These are very basic areas and we are including a map for you to see the actual boundaries.
The resolution would be to divide the district at the current boundary that splits Barnes and simply have two large voting districts. We would then select three board members from the Hanover area which would run from the north part of Barnes to the state line. We would also select three board members from the south part that would include the southern part of Barnes to our southern border. We would continue voting in one at-large member from the entire district.
If the resolution is passed, we would plan on this being on the general election ballot and the voters could then decide if this is how they want to be represented on the local Board of Education. If the voters passed it, then the April school board election would go into effect for those positions. As we continue to move through school board elections, this new format would take place.
If you have any questions or concerns about this, please contact a board member to discuss it. We relish your thoughts on this process.
Click HERE to view the map with the current district boundaries.
Steve Joonas
Superintendent
