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Voters approved about 60% of 33 school district property tax measures around Colorado on Nov. 3, unofficial election results show, with wins in districts ranging from Denver, the state’s largest district, to Prairie, one of the smallest.
The share of successful school district ballot measures this year is fairly standard, given that half to two-thirds generally pass. But even in districts where voters rejected local asks, there’s a silver lining with the likely passage of two statewide ballot measures, Proposition NN and Amendment 87, which could send billions of additional dollars to schools over the next decade.
Three types of school district measures were on the ballot Tuesday, according to the Colorado School Finance Project, which tracks the results.
Voters approved six of seven bond measures, which pay for school construction and building maintenance. The Archuleta and Holyoke districts also approved tax increases for the funding matches required to receive school construction grants from the state’s Building Excellent Schools Today, or BEST, program.
Mill levy overrides, which typically help pay for operating costs such as staff salaries, saw lower success rates than other school tax measures this year. About a dozen of 24 measures passed, including in metro districts like Denver, Littleton, and Westminster, and mountain districts like Roaring Fork, Eagle County, Summit, and Telluride.
Notable losses occurred in two of Colorado’s largest districts: Douglas County School District and Jeffco Public Schools, where two school ballot measures were failing Thursday. Voters in several medium-sized and small districts, including Mesa County Valley, Eaton, Hanover, and Hayden, also rejected ballot measures Nov. 3.
“The needs facing Jeffco Public Schools remain significant,” interim Jeffco Superintendent Rob Stein and school board President Michelle Applegate said in a statement Wednesday evening. “Without the additional funding proposed in these two measures, we will need to make difficult decisions about how to balance our priorities with the resources available to us.”
Jeffco leaders previously said that if the measures failed, the district could face more school closures, staff layoffs, or salary freezes.
Most of the 26 districts with mill levy overrides on the ballot planned to use some of the proceeds to boost staff pay. Several also planned to beef up career and technical education and school security.
Fiona Boomer, executive director of the Douglas County Federation, the local teachers union, said several factors likely contributed to voters in that district rejecting a mill levy override, including a crowded ballot, poor planning by district officials, and less specificity on how the money would be spent compared with a 2023 ballot issue that passed.
“All in all, not as much effort went into it this cycle as it did in 2023,” she said.
Boomer said the Douglas County teachers have the lowest salaries compared to peer districts in the Denver area. The ballot measure, which called for 4% raises for district staff, would have put them on par with Jeffco, she said.
The average Douglas County teacher salary in the district was about $74,000 last year, according to Colorado Department of Education data. Salaries were higher in two large neighboring districts: about $82,000 in Jeffco and $96,000 in Cherry Creek.
“Douglas County for a long time didn’t tax itself for school district funding,” Boomer said. “So they are well behind the rest of the metro in that regard.”
Ann Schimke is a senior reporter at Chalkbeat. Contact Ann at aschimke@chalkbeat.org.
