Voters will decide Tuesday, Nov. 3, on school system bonding proposals that include extending present bonds and debt-payoff millage or extending bonds and adding debt-millage payoff. Purchase of some school buses is also in the Corunna Public Schools bonding proposal. The city of Durand has a proposal for renewal of a quarter mill for SATA operations.
The Owosso School District has the largest of the bonding proposals for Tuesday, at $49.5 million to be repaid over 30 years with a 5.5 mill property tax increase for a Middle School addition to Owosso High School, renovating the high school, adding a 1,000-seat auditorium on the front of OHS, air conditioning all buildings and purchasing four school buses. Bus purchases historically have been paid for through school system operating funds in a number of school districts. Owosso Public Schools officials have said that “if” the 30-year $49.5 million bond is approved Tuesday, the school bus purchases will be paid for with a seven-year bond.
After the Owosso School District paid off all bond debt a number of years ago, voters were asked to approve a 3-mill, three-year Sinking Fund for annual work on the schools, which voters supported. Annual projects using the more than $1.5 million have included new windows in buildings along with parking lot improvements.
The late-1920s Middle School, built as Owosso High School, became the Junior High after construction of the present OHS in the early 1960s. It was about 40 years ago that voters approved bonding for major updating to the Junior High (now known as Owosso Middle School). During the more than one-year construction that included new heating and
electrical systems, air conditioning the about 900-seat auditorium and other work, junior high students were on split sessions at OHS.
Polls for the election will be open the usual 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. Tuesday.
