Viewpoint: Missoula kids need you to vote yes on levy
Denise Juneau
I’m a public school kid. I grew up in a small Montana community where the school was the center of everything. My grandma was the school cook, my grandpa was a bus driver, and my parents were both educators. My teachers believed that my peers and I had a future worth building. The community coalesced around young people to attend our school and athletic events.
Because these people believed in me, I was able to grow up, graduate, go to college, serve as Montana's State Superintendent of Public Instruction, and eventually lead one of the largest school districts in the country. None of that happens without public schools that work.
None of that happens without schools that are funded, staffed, and supported by people who understand that investing in children is the most Montana thing you can do. I have spent my career in public education, as a classroom teacher, as Superintendent of Public Instruction, and as Superintendent of Seattle Public Schools. I know what it looks like when communities invest in their children.
On May 5, voters will decide whether to renew operational levies for our K-8 and high school districts. I am asking you to vote yes on both. Passing these levies helps keep our schools functioning at the level Missoula expects and our students deserve.
What will that money do? It pays for a quality teacher in every classroom. It funds special education and supports paraeducators working one-on-one with students who need extra help. It keeps the lights on, heat running, and buildings open. It pays for up-to-date curriculum, so students graduate with opportunities for college and careers. It pays the coaches and advisors who make music, sports, and extracurriculars possible for thousands of kids, and then gets them to their events. These are not luxuries. They are the basic architecture of a functioning school district.
In Montana, the state covers roughly 80% of basic educational costs. The remaining 20% comes from local voters through levies exactly like these. That is how the state legislature built school funding. Levies are not emergency measures or a workaround. They are the normal, intended mechanism for funding public education. When levies fail, that 20% disappears, and it comes directly out of classrooms.
Making the fiscal picture more challenging is a reality facing school districts nationally.
Enrollment is declining. Lower birth rates and rising cost-of-living mean fewer students are walking through our doors. Fewer students means less state revenue. But the bills do not shrink accordingly. You cannot cut a school building in half because it’s serving fewer students. Heating costs, staffing costs, and insurance remain largely fixed. Meanwhile, the state’s annual funding increases have not kept pace with inflation.
Levies are how Missoula closes that gap.
Public school helped me succeed and my belief in it is why I now sit on the school board. I believe Missoula's schools are worth fighting for. I have seen what happens to districts that let erosion creep; decisions to cut a position here, eliminate a program there, and nudge class sizes upward. The damage is rarely dramatic. It accumulates quietly; by the time a community notices, a generation has already paid the price.
Missoula is a community that takes its schools seriously. The levies are an opportunity to reaffirm that commitment, for less than $9 annually per $100,000 of assessed property value. That is an extraordinary value.
A vote for the levies helps build the next generation and keep our strong public schools intact and thriving. You will soon receive your mail-in ballot. Please vote YES to MCPS elementary and high school levies before May 5.
Denise Juneau is a member of the Missoula County Public Schools Board of Trustees, a former Montana State Superintendent of Public Instruction, and a former Superintendent of Seattle Public Schools.