No recall petition on School Board budget, please
By Scott White
Community Liaison and Staff Reporter
If you have children in Woodford County Public Schools, or have been a regular reader of the Sun, or have attended or watched a WCPS Board Meeting (Board), or have been to one of WC Public Schools Superintendent Lori Jones’ Hive events, then you are well aware that our school system has been struggling with budget issues over the last few years.
The issue is simple – does the Board have sufficient revenues to provide our county’s students with a high-level public-school education? In our view, it does not.
And now that the Board is taking a responsible step with its proposed fiscal year 2026-27 budget, the last thing we need to do is hamstring it with a recall petition vote on the tax rate. Not only would that be chaotic, but it would also risk the steps the Board and Jones are undertaking to stabilize the district’s finances.
In fact, our editorial position is that a recall petition would be shortsighted, and arguably irresponsible, given the stakes.
The budget proposed by Jones, which the Board will soon vote on and, we hope, approve, calls for maintaining the current rate of 63.3%, or 63.3 cents per $100 of assessed property value. This rate, though, because of the complexities of state funding, makes it subject to a recall petition . . . even though the rate is the same as that used in FY 2025-26.
And not just that, but the current rate of 63.3 cents is an historical 14-year low property tax rate for Woodford County; the rate was over 70% just a few short years ago.
As our education reporter Bob Vlach wrote in his feature on WCPS Finance Director Jason Gribbins in last week’s Sun, this continuation rate will generate more than 4% in additional local revenue (money received from county property taxes) because of higher property values reassessed in one of four quadrants this past year. (Woodford County Property Valuation Administrator John Paul Coyle reassesses county property values on each quadrant every four years on a rotational basis.)
As Bob wrote, “(Gribbins) explained why adopting a 63.3-cent rate won’t necessarily generate more than 4 percent in additional revenue because of how the state’s per-student funding formula (SEEK) equalizes funding for public school districts in Kentucky. ‘Because of high local property values, the district receives less per-pupil funding from the state than most counties in Kentucky,’ Gribbins said. ‘And by next school year, we’ll be approaching 80 percent local funding.’”
SEEK is the state funding mechanism the Kentucky Legislature came up with in response to the seminal Kentucky Supreme Court decision in 1988 that held the funding of Kentucky public schools was unconstitutional by recognizing the reality that the quality of children’s education was entirely predicated on where they lived. For example, a student in a county with a strong economy, like Woodford or Fayette, was going to get a better education than a student living in Owsley or Muhlenberg counties.
Today, Woodford County is in the bottom 5% of counties in the state in per-pupil funding, according to the Kentucky Department of Education – and this is because we are one of the state’s wealthiest counties and our student population has stagnated at about 4,000.
As Gribbins explained to me in an email, “Given the current trajectory, local revenue will account for 80% of our school system’s per-pupil funding in the very near future.” This means that, ultimately, investing in our students as future community leaders, upholding our district’s high standards, and preserving our competitive excellence is a responsibility that belongs entirely to us, Woodford Countians.
The 1988 court decision led the legislature to enact the Kentucky Education Reform Act in 1990, which directly took on the state funding issue, as well as a number of other reforms designed to make Kentucky the envy of the nation.
While many of the reforms have fallen by the wayside due to either not being effective or a lack of political will to stick with them, the school funding piece, the part that led to the Supreme Court’s decision, has remained in place. Inherent in this reform was that wealthy counties would choose to fund their schools at appropriate levels given their higher tax bases. Again, it is up to us, Woodford Countians, to responsibly fund our public schools.
Last year, it was no secret that Woodford County schools had serious financial issues. Setting aside an autopsy to examine those reasons in this column, last year, the Board, in a surprise decision, chose not to raise the tax rate even though it was facing a $2.8 million shortfall.
At the August 2025 meeting, where the decision to forego a rate increase was made, a few property owners spoke against the increase, threatening to file a recall vote petition. It was no idle threat. Two of the speakers led the charge years ago when Woodford County voters beat back the so-called “nickel tax,” a rate increase the Board needed to generate funding to build a much-needed new high school. We saw what that did – it ultimately forced the board to take on significant debt and debt service by issuing bonds to build the school. And, for anyone who attended the old high school (including me), it was plain that this should have been done 20 years ago instead of waiting so long and loading up on debt instead of paying for it with revenues from the “nickle tax.”
At last August’s meeting, Board Chair Adam Brickler, who had earlier indicated he was leaning towards supporting the higher rate, made a wise decision and showed his bona fides as a leader.
Brickler received criticism for voting against the rate increase. Instead, with new Superintendent Jones in place, he said the Board should attempt to determine if it could operate the schools within a budget using the 63.3% rate, which would generate a modest increase, but below the amount that could trigger a recall petition. This then left the district with a $2.8 million operating deficit which the Board tried to solve with the old saw of eliminating “waste and inefficiencies.”
We have just completed that school year.
Jones, her Central Office leadership team, principals, teachers and staff deserve Purple Hearts for their courage and Oscars for their creativity in delivering an excellent school year for our students despite the nearly $3 million dollar deficit.
While some of the cuts and cutbacks were needed and created new efficiencies, which will boost outcomes, many of the cuts and cutbacks were deep and impacted classrooms; but if this year’s budget continues at the same 2025-26 funding level, we will see Woodford County Public Schools begin an inevitable decline.
To operate within last year’s budget, Jones created an ad hoc budget committee comprised of administrators, teachers, non-teaching staff, parents and community members to make recommendations that would have the least impact on students.
As a result, Jones cut $1.2 million from the Central Office budget and seven teaching positions while instituting an array of price controls.
Those cuts to Central Office and things like consolidation to realize efficiencies no longer exist. Chronic challenges remain, and newer ones have arisen, some worse, given external forces like inflationary prices, cost spikes in diesel fuel and insurance premiums, bond service, and any number of fixed and rising costs. “Tightening our belts” is no longer an available option; it was tightened last year, and now there is a risk of squeezing the school system to death.
Next week, the Sun will be giving space for a column by Superintendent Jones, who will address some of the ways the system will use tax revenues to continue to uphold WCPS’ reputation for excellence. Be on the lookout for it.
Our students deserve the proposed 2026-27 budget.
Given we are in the midst of a significant local election cycle, we will likely hear candidates, who do not directly impact the schools as do school board members, talk about how the county’s future is its children, why a big reason to live in Woodford County is because of its outstanding school system, and, if elected, how they will do all they can to partner with and support the public school system to maintain the level of excellence we have come to rely on.
Let’s hope they do.
Though we think the facts support a higher than 63.3% tax rate, we endorse Jones, Gribbins and the Board’s proposal and their collective belief that they can achieve the mission of excellence by continuing the 63.3% rate.
Jones and Gribbins will soon be holding forums all over the county to educate Woodford Countians on the need for this tax rate, what the schools are doing with the money, and why the revenues generated from that rate are vital.
Attend one of them. The dates will be published on the district’s website and in other ways.
Read Bob Vlach’s recent articles on the school board meetings, where these issues have been discussed in detail. Follow Bob’s upcoming stories about the forum discussions over the next few months. Go back and read Bob’s feature on Gribbins in the July 9 edition of the Sun, where Gribbins explained these issues in a way that even I could understand. If you missed it, we are posting it in full on our Facebook page this week. Also, take a read, if you haven’t yet, of Al Cross’ narrative Op-ed that ran last week about one of Kentucky’s poorest counties, Clinton, accepting a significant tax rate rather than any of its citizens filing a recall petition.
We think if folks are informed, they will agree that the 63.3% tax rate is fair and necessary.
Even though you may be tempted to file a recall petition and put the rate of 63.3 cents per $100 of assessed property value (or $63 on $100,000 in value) up for a countywide vote—we ask you, as a member of this community, not to do it and to ask your neighbors not to either.
Instead, let’s all support the Board’s responsible decision on the FY 2026-27 budget.
Please.