Voters may be asked to OK new tax to benefit schools

Funds would increase teacher salaries, security and counselors

For the third time in four years, Palm Beach County voters may be asked to raise taxes to benefit schools.

They said yes in 2014 to a property tax to pay arts and physical education teachers. In 2016, they approved a sales tax for school and other construction projects. And now the School Board is looking to ask them for more, while acknowledging the risk that voters will be reluctant.

Like many districts, Palm Beach is struggling with how to pay teachers more while also improving security and mental health care.

The latest proposal would add $1 to every $1,000 in taxable value and would be dedicated to teacher salaries, school security and counselors. The School Board will decide Wednesday whether to place the question on the Nov. 6 ballot.

“This is an extremely high-stakes proposal,” said Michael Burke, the school district’s chief financial officer. “The community has high expectations for school security and mental health care, and they want teachers to make more money. The only way we can bring this revenue to the district is to turn to the voters.”

Like many school districts across the state and the country, Palm Beach County schools have a high turnover

rate for teachers. At the end of the 2017 school year, there were 1,500 open positions out of a teaching workforce of about 12,000. That’s slightly higher than Broward’s teacher turnover rate of 8 percent to 9 percent.

At the same time, the number of students seeking teaching degrees in Florida’s universities has dropped about 30 percent, forcing school districts to compete for the best candidates by offering higher salaries. Property owners already pay $7 in state and local school taxes for every $1,000 in value. The new tax would raise $200 million a year for four years, Burke said. Here’s the breakdown:

$50 million would continue the arts teacher program and allow the school district to hire additional elective teachers. The existing tax for the program — 25 cents for every $1,000 in taxable value — expires this year and pays the salaries of 650 arts, music, physical education, career and technical education teachers.

$50 million would pay for additional school security officers and mental health counselors. These are requirements of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Public Safety Act, passed by the state Legislature after the Feb. 14 massacre at the Parkland high school. The tax will allow the district to double the size of its police force to 300 officers for its 185 schools and give each one a car and the proper equipment. Every elementary school would have an officer on campus, middle schools would have two and high schools would have two or three, depending on its size.

$100 million would supplement teacher salaries, an effort to stem the turnover rate. Teachers with one to five years of experience would get $1,000 a year, six to nine years would get $5,000 a year, and teachers with 10 or more years experience would get $10,000 a year for the duration of the tax.

“$10,000 is a nice chunk of change,” said Jerry O’Donnell, a 22-year teacher at Eagles Landing Middle School, west of Boca Raton. “It’ll keep teachers around for a while, especially older teachers with the most experience.”

The typical South Florida teacher salary ranges from about $48,000 to about $56,800. Starting salary for a Palm Beach County teacher is $41,000; the average annual wage is $50,325.

“When you look at average teacher pay in Florida vs. other states, we are near the bottom,” said Lee Williams, a commercial real estate appraiser whose children graduated from Boca Raton High School. “We need to be more competitive. If we’re trying to attract businesses, we need a good public education system.”

Teacher Joe Mayerchak at Omni Middle School in Boca Raton said he was concerned retired voters may resist a new property tax.

“I’m not sure the real estate tax is the way to go on this,” said Mayerchak, who retired as a general contractor and became a teacher 10 years ago. “There should be incentives to keep teachers, but they should figure out another way.”

Some voters say billing the new tax as a teacher salary increase is misleading.

“Everyone is in favor of paying teachers more, but this isn’t that,” said Mary Lindsey, a Lake Worth education activist. “It was stupid to tie this in with (the expiring tax that pays for art teachers). If this fails, there go our music and art programs.”

Although arts programs could suffer if voters veto the tax, improved security and mental health care are now state mandates.

Gov. Rick Scott has set a goal of one mental health professional for every 750 students. Palm Beach County currently has about one for every 2,000, similar to the statewide average, while the National Association of School Psychologists recommends one for every 500 to 700 kids.

The district wants to hire 96 school psychologists, as well as 50 mental health counselors and social workers. The American School Counselor Association recommends one counselor for every 250 students, but Palm Beach County high schools have one for every 435 students.

“Mental health and security do need to be dealt with,” said Gina Greenwald, parent of a fifth grader at Addison Mizner Elementary in Boca Raton. “We already pay a lot in property taxes, and I don’t mind that. But we haven’t seen the penny sales tax come to fruition yet, at least at our school. I am concerned that things are so slow to get done.”

School board member Erica Whitfield said she understands voters’ hesitations, but said there is no alternative for protecting schools and improving teacher pay.

“I definitely don’t like asking taxpayers for more money, because we just did,” she said. “We’re in a bit of a pickle. Security is in the forefront for everyone. The costs are not small, and we can’t cut in other places. It makes sense to me to ask voters to pay for these things that are so important to all of us.”