Republicans, Democrats in the statehouse disagree on blame, solutions to education-related property tax increases as legislature adjourns without action on school funding
At the Jan. 8 regular meeting of the River Valley School District Board of Education, action was taken on policy updates regarding cell phone usage in schools and open enrollment, to accept seven new course offerings into the district course catalog and update the district’s school start date for the 2026-2027 school year.
At the Feb. 12 regular meeting, the board heard updates regarding the district’s upcoming tax levy, recognized the Spring Green Literary Festival for its community spotlight and voted on policy updates regarding board member compensation, staff code of conduct, staff involvement in legal matters and student admission filing requirements.
JAN. 8 MEETING
Policy updates: Cell phone ban and open enrollment
Policy 443.6 Student Cell Phones and Personal Communication Devices has been heavily revised. The modification was spurred by 2025 Wisconsin Act 42, which requires public school districts to implement policy which prohibits most uses of personal cell phones and communication devices during instructional time.
Under the district’s revised policy, all personal communications devices must be powered off and kept in either a student’s locker or vehicle during the whole school day, and violations of this rule will result in the device being confiscated for the remainder of the school day and/or further disciplinary action.
Some exceptions exist, which allow the use of devices when authorized by the administration during emergencies, management of student health with approval of a nurse or administration, through a student special education plan or if authorized by a teacher for educational purposes during class.
The policy states that only parent or guardian messages will be relayed to students through the office, and that students will not be pulled from instructional time to take phone calls or messages unless in an emergency.
Policies 423 and 423-Rule Public School Open Enrollment are discussed annually by the board in anticipation for student open enrollment going into the upcoming school year. For core subjects and standard education students, all grade levels in the district have open enrollment space available.
Pupil Services Director Claire Knoll provided data for open enrollment for special education, projecting that only the Intermediate school would have spaces available for special education open enrollment for the 2026-2027 school year.
Policies 443.6, 423 and 423 Rule were accepted unanimously by the board in second reading, and adopted into permanent district policy.
New course offerings
The board considered introducing seven new courses to the curriculum in the district.
These new courses include: Officiating and Musical Theater History & Performance, each for .5 credits, open for grades 9-12, Zoology and Ecology each for .5 credits, open to grades 10-12, ACT Prep for .5 credits for grade 11 and Applied Mathematics in Construction and Art Senior Studio for .5 credits, open to grade 12.
“These are new classes our teachers are passionate about offering, I think it’ll benefit our students,” Darby Blakely, high school principal, said.
The board unanimously approved accepting the new courses into the course catalog for the upcoming year.
Though courses are added to the roster, Blakely noted that classes still need sufficient interest from students to run.
2026-2027 school year start date
The board considered moving the start date for all grade levels and schools to a single day, September 1. This changes from the past system where grades 10 through 12 started one day later to provide incoming grade 9 students a day to become acquainted with the High School.
Superintendent Loren Glasbrenner noted, due to the updated single campus district configuration, a transition day would no longer be needed.
The board unanimously approved the consolidated start date for the district.
FEB. 12 MEETING
Tax levy changes
Director of Finance and Operations Brian Krey provided an update to the board regarding the upcoming 2026 property tax levy for the district’s 2026-2027 fiscal year.
What’s a referendum? What’s a revenue limit?
Designed to control property taxes and encourage efficient use of funds, revenue limits combine local property tax revenues with state aid to determine the total amount a district can spend per student annually. The Wisconsin legislature’s decision to freeze or minimally adjust revenue limits has forced districts to rely heavily on referenda.
If a district determines it needs more money than the state allows, it cannot simply raise taxes to make up the difference. Instead, the district must ask voters for permission to exceed the revenue limit through a public referendum.
This process begins with the school board, which identifies the funding shortfall and passes a resolution outlining how much additional money is needed, for what purposes and for how long. The proposed increase—sometimes recurring indefinitely and other times temporary—is then presented to voters in the district as a ballot question during an election. If the majority of voters approve the referendum, the district is allowed to exceed the revenue limit and collect the additional property tax revenue.
On the other hand, if voters reject the referendum, the district must operate within the existing revenue limit, which often forces difficult decisions such as cutting programs, reducing staff or delaying maintenance. Exceeding the revenue limit is sometimes referred to as “exceeding the levy limit” because it directly affects how much the district can levy in property taxes.
Revenue limits are a cap on the total amount of money a school district can raise from two primary sources: state aid and local property taxes. Revenue limits determine the total budget a district can work with for general operations, such as teacher salaries, transportation, utilities and classroom supplies. This limit is set per student and varies between districts based on local property wealth and state aid formulas. A school district cannot exceed the revenue limit unless it holds a referendum and gains voter approval to raise additional funds.
Levy limits specifically control how much a district can collect from local property taxes—one of the two components of the revenue limit. The levy amount is determined after accounting for how much state aid the district receives. For example: If a district’s total revenue limit is $10 million and it receives $6 million in state aid, it can levy $4 million in property taxes. If state aid increases, the allowable levy decreases to stay within the revenue limit. While revenue limits cap the total money schools can raise, levy limits specifically cap the property tax portion of that total.
Revenue limits are the total amount of funding a school district can raise from state aid and property taxes combined. Levy limits are the maximum portion of that total that can come from local property taxes.
Krey informed the board that if the district were to take full advantage of the increased revenue limit—as provided by the district’s 2025 operational referendum and by the state after Governor Tony Evers’ 2023 line item veto—the tax levy increase would be 13.27% year over year. This is due to state aid not being increased and the full financial burden of any spending increases being placed on local taxpayers.
How does Wisconsin public school funding work? The “box” analogy.
(For a deeper dive into this analogy, you can view the referenced lecture here: https://youtu.be/zGKjlc9F-PM).
Wisconsin public school finance can be complicated, but it helps to visualize a district’s funding as a “box.” This box represents the revenue limit—a fixed, legally mandated maximum amount of money a school district can receive per student.
By law, this box must always be completely full, and it is filled by combining two primary sources of funds:
- State Aid: Money distributed by the Wisconsin state government.
- Local Property Taxes: Money collected from property owners within the school district.
Equalizing the System: The formula is purposefully designed to equalize school funding across different districts based on their local property wealth:
- Property-rich districts can raise significant funds even with lower tax rates. Because the math works in their favor, they receive less state aid, meaning their box is heavily filled by local property taxes.
- Property-poor districts cannot raise enough money locally, even when taxing at a higher rate. To balance this out, they receive more state aid to ensure their box is fully funded.
The “State Aid” Misconception: A common misconception is that if the state allocates more money to “state aid,” schools automatically get more money to spend on their students. However, if the revenue limit (the actual size of the box) remains flat, no additional money goes to the children.
Instead, that increase in state aid simply takes up more room inside the existing box, which in turn reduces the amount needed from local property taxes. This creates local property tax relief, but the district’s overall operational budget for the year doesn’t actually grow.
The 2011 Shift – Why the Box Stopped Growing: Prior to 2011, the size of a district’s revenue limit box was legally tied to the Consumer Price Index (CPI). As inflation drove up the cost of basic needs like heating, insurance, and teacher salaries, the revenue limit automatically increased to keep pace.
In 2011, the state legislature severed that tie to inflation and simultaneously reduced overall funding. Because the revenue limit no longer rises automatically with inflation, a significant gap—currently estimated at over $3,300 per pupil—has formed between what it costs to run a school and what the state allows districts to collect.
Making the Box Bigger: When schools face rising costs just to maintain the status quo, they need a larger budget. To get more money, the revenue limit box itself must get bigger. By law, there are strictly two ways to increase the size of this box:
- The state legislature votes to increase the revenue limit.
For context, prior to completely freezing revenue limits during the 2021-2023 budget cycle, the legislature’s last adjustment was in the 2019-2021 budget, which offered modest increases of $175 and $179 per pupil over those two years. While the legislature did approve a $325 per-pupil increase for the 2023-2025 budget (which Governor Tony Evers extended for 400 years using a line-item veto), for many districts, this still hasn’t been enough to close the financial gap created by years of stagnant limits and record inflation. - Local voters approve a school funding referendum, granting the district permission to collect funds beyond the state-imposed limit.
Because the legislature has largely held revenue limits flat, districts have increasingly turned to voters. These referenda typically fall into two categories:
Operating Referenda: Used simply to keep the lights on and keep teachers employed. These can be non-recurring(a one-time shot of funds) or recurring (a permanent increase to the district’s tax levy). Operating referenda are rarely used to build new programs; they are almost exclusively used to maintain a district’s status quo in the face of static state revenue limits.
Capital (Issued Debt) Referenda: Used for one-time major expenses, like repairing a roof or building a new facility.
“Based on the increase taxpayers received in 2025-2026, we believe we must make reductions in our budget in order to provide property tax relief in 2026-2027,” Krey said in response to follow-up questions after the meeting. “While we want to continue to be efficient and effective with every dollar, we also understand that without community support for an operational referendum in 2028, River Valley will face significant challenges in maintaining educational opportunities for students.”
Krey stated the district, if approved by the board when the budget is set in October, would reduce the tax levy to 5.1% as an effort to reduce the burden on local taxpayers.
“It just feels odd that a school board is being tasked with providing tax relief, rather than doing the work of providing an education to our students,” Loren Glasbrenner, district superintendent, said. “You’re subsuming the responsibility of legislators based on their inactivity at the State Capitol, and it just is unfortunate.”
Glasbrenner, along with area superintendents from Baraboo, Reedsburg, Sauk Prairie, Weston and Wisconsin Dells, released a letter Feb. 17 which endorsed a statement from the five largest school districts in Wisconsin calling for state legislators and Evers to act on the $2.4 billion state budget surplus to provide funding to schools and provide property tax relief.
Krey detailed that—if the board decided on a 5.1% increase to the tax levy, rather than the 13.27% allowed—the district would reduce the buildings and grounds budget by $790,000, a $72,000 reduction in textbook budget and a 3% wage increase for staff, instead of 4%. This results in a total dollar amount reduction of $982,000 from the revenue limit.
“While we believe our projected expenditures for books and classroom materials can be adjusted to accommodate a reduced budget, there would be impacts in other areas,” Krey said.
Specifically, Krey stated that the district would not be able to move forward with planned classroom updates for spaces that had not been renovated in 25 years or more.
Krey said that with the reduced capital maintenance budget, the projects slated in the district’s long-term facilities plan would also be deferred, and the district would only be able to focus on roof replacement and classroom flooring replacements. This shelves improvements to sidewalks, roadway curb and gutters, parking lots, door replacements and renovations to bathrooms and classrooms. Krey also stated that the district has no current plans for expansion, new buildings or other major construction projects.
While the district does have $905,506 in its building fund account as of January, Krey noted that this money might only be able to support some classroom updates, and a balance must be maintained as a contingency fund for unanticipated and unforeseen expenses such as building mechanical equipment failure or emergency building repairs.
The district is currently working to assemble a preliminary budget for June, ahead of the state releasing its initial general aid estimates in July. The final budget cannot be certified by the board until October—after fall enrollment is counted and the state confirms final aid numbers—in order to provide accurate tax levy data to municipalities in November.
Policy updates: Board member compensation, admissions name, personnel policy
Policy 164 Board Member Compensation and Expenses was updated to have a simplified pay rate per meeting, which is an update from the previous pay scheme which included a salary, per meeting pay and hourly wages for committee or out of district business.
Under the previous scheme, the board was paid $65 per each regular or special board meeting, $15 per hour for committee meetings and $15 an hour for time spent out of district on school business. Annual salaries were $1,000 for the president, $100 for the vice president, $500 for the clerk and $100 for the treasurer.
The new scheme pays $165 per board meeting for the president, $90 for the vice president, $125 for the clerk, $90 for the treasurer and $80 for all other board members. Hourly pay and annual salaries were eliminated. The new policy allows for actual and necessary expenses when traveling for district business.
Policy 420 School Admissions added an elaboration that in the student documentation submitted for enrollment, the documentation must contain the student’s legal name, as it had no previous mention of name.
Policy 524.2 Code of Conduct and for all River Valley Employees and Elected Officials added four bullets regarding advancement of private economic interests using a position in the district, accepting items of value for the purpose of influencing judgement, using a position or property in the district for partisan political or religious purposes and providing lessons or services unless entirely outside of district responsibilities.
Policy 529 Personnel Involvement in Legal Matters and Court-Related Actions is a newly drafted policy which details how staff should respond to legal matters within the district, including receipt of legal documents, subpoenas and testimonies, due process rights and court orders regarding student enrollment details. The policy directs staff to immediately inform administration upon receipt of any legal document naming them, prohibits staff from producing confidential records or providing testimony without notification of administration, absolves employees of liability for furnishing records in accordance with law or regulation and mandates strict adherence to due process in administrative actions such as suspension or expulsion.
Policy 164 was unanimously accepted by the board in first reading and will be taken up for a second reading with any amendments at the March meeting. Policies 420, 524.2 and 529 were unanimously accepted by the board in second reading and adopted into district policy.
Community Spotlight
The board recognized the Spring Green Literary Festival for the February Community Spotlight. The Literary Festival holds book discussions, cultural events, American Players Theatre production readings and other various literary related events in the River Valley area.
It also provides funding to the district to gift 4K through 2nd grade students with a new book for their birthday, as well as provides funds for the Books for Babies program through local libraries where new parents can receive a free package of books for their child. Jan McCormick, president of the Literary Festival board, accepted the recognition alongside other members of the Literary Festival board.
STATE IMPACT
Legislature adjourns without action on education funding
On Feb. 20—without taking any action regarding public school funding, despite calls from school districts and state educators—the Wisconsin State Assembly adjourned its session for the year.
In January, Governor Evers proposed to utilize Wisconsin’s $2.4 billion budget surplus to boost state aid to schools while simultaneously offering property tax relief to residents. Evers, a Democrat, stipulated that any agreement reached with the state legislature—controlled by Republicans—must contain $200 million towards Special Education Reimbursement and $450 million to General Equalization Aid—colloquially often referred to as “state aid,” the primary source of revenue from the state—towards schools.
Four days before adjournment, on Feb. 16, Senate Majority Leader Devin LeMahieu and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos sent a letter to Governor Tony Evers outlining a potential compromise for the state’s $2.4 billion surplus. The proposal agrees to the governor’s request for $200 million in additional general purpose revenue for special education reimbursements. However, a significant gap remains regarding general school support: while the Republicans proposed $500 million for the School Levy Tax Credit, this funding mechanism is paid to municipalities to offset property tax bills and does not provide any additional spending power or direct revenue to school districts. This stands in contrast to Governor Evers’ request for $450 million in General Equalization Aid, which would flow directly into school budgets to fund operations.
Republicans in the legislature have been highly critical of a line item veto Governor Evers utilized in the state’s 2023 budget that allows districts to increase their per-pupil spending limit by $325 per year for the next 400 years. Often as part of school budget negotiations, GOP representatives have demanded that the veto be overturned, and frequently blame it for rising property taxes.
“Often our school boards go to referendum to maintain the size of their budget, so referendums have been passed in a lot of our communities over the last several years and obviously this has contributed, in part, to the increase in some of the property taxes,” Howard Marklein, state senator (R-Spring Green) and Joint Finance Committee co-chair, said in a statement. “The second variable that has a big impact on our property taxes is the impact of the 400 year veto… so the effect of that is we have a $325 per pupil tax increase that will increase into the future for 400 years, so this is the second variable that has had a big impact on our property taxes.”
What’s a mill rate?
The mill rate is a way to calculate property taxes in Wisconsin, including those used to fund public school districts. It represents the amount of tax owed per $1,000 of a property’s assessed value. For example, if the mill rate is 5, a property owner pays $5 in taxes for every $1,000 of their property’s assessed value. To calculate the mill rate, the school district determines its total tax levy—the amount it needs to collect from local property taxes—and divides that by the total assessed property value in the district. The result is then multiplied by 1,000 to express the mill rate.
In 2011, the state legislature removed the law that linked mill rates to inflation, which has resulted in a significant decrease in the inflation-indexed value of money going to districts. This, along with reductions in state aid to public schooling has resulted in districts, like River Valley, turning to using operational referendums to help supplement their revenues and maintain sufficient operational budgets.
River Valley’s mill rate is 7.36 for 2025-2026.
LeMahieu and Vos also point property tax increases squarely at Evers’ veto in their letter, defending their school tax levy credit, stating: “This is a generous, good-faith attempt to achieve our mutual goals of limiting the property tax impact caused by your misguided 400-year veto.”
However, contrary to LeMahieu, Vos and Marklein’s statements, the 400 year veto does not automatically increase general school aid, property taxes or district income, according to experts, and has no direct impact on the dollar amount in taxes which landowners pay. Any extra school funding requires each district to individually increase their tax levy.
“School board members are ultimately responsible for setting their budgets, and voters should view it that way,” Ross Milton, University of Wisconsin-Madison assistant professor and expert on school finance, said. “School districts are not required to levy taxes up to the maximum allowed under the revenue limit.”
River Valley and 88 other school districts went to referendum in 2025 despite Evers’ 400 year veto, showing that even that the increased revenue limit is insufficient to fully fund schools.
“The revenue limit applies to the combination of state aid and local property taxes, so additional state aid would generally reduce the amount that needs to be raised locally through the property tax,” Milton said. “For districts at their limit, this must be the case unless the district goes to referendum to raise revenue above the limit.”
72 school districts, though not including River Valley, have referendums on the ballot April 7, and require local voter approval to further increase revenue limits.
Some districts in the state, such as Hustisford and Lake Country districts, say they will be forced to pursue consolidation or even dissolution if upcoming referendums fail.
“When we look at referendums, most referendums are operational referendums…what do we need to keep the doors open and the kids provided with education,” Sarah Keyeski, state senator (D-Lodi), said at a public education funding panel in Spring Green on Feb. 26.
Wisconsin school districts, like River Valley, have had to balance their tax burden on their local communities and their need to pay teachers and maintain district infrastructure.
“A $325 increase raises the average revenue limit by 2.3 percent, which is below the current rate of inflation,” Andrew Reschovsky, University of Wisconsin-Madison professor emeritus of public affairs and applied economics, said. “Even at a low rate of inflation, a fixed dollar increase in the revenue limits would continuously reduce the amount of inflation-adjusted revenues available to fund public education.”
The rate of inflation in the past two years has averaged 2.81%, utilizing US Bureau of Labor Statistics consumer price index inflation data.
“When more school funding comes from the state and less from local property taxes, the practical effect—whether you view it as good or bad—is that the financing shifts away from property tax bills and toward statewide taxes like the income tax and sales tax, which generally moves more of the burden toward higher-income households and away from the property tax which takes up a larger share of income for lower- and middle-income households than high-income households,” Milton said.
Evers’ stipulation for the $450 million in General Equalization Aid to school districts was not agreed to in Vos and LeMahieu’s compromise letter to the governor. Ultimately no compromise was met and no increase to funding was passed for schools prior to the adjournment of the Assembly session.
“Rising costs necessitate additional education spending if school districts want to maintain or improve the quality of education,” Reschovsky said. “The most recent data for Wisconsin school districts suggests that student academic performance has not fully recovered from the pandemic era learning losses. Increased federal funding to address these issues is no longer available. All this adds to the financial pressures on local school districts. The small annual increases in revenue limits over most of the past 15 or so years has put substantial financial pressure on school districts throughout the state, both urban and rural, and property-poor and property-wealthy districts.”
Lawsuit filed claiming legislature is not adequately funding public school
On Feb. 23, a group of parents, students, school districts, education advocacy groups and teachers’ unions filed a lawsuit in Eau Claire County Circuit Court against the state legislature and joint finance committee. The lawsuit alleges that the legislature has not sufficiently met the obligations for public education as laid out in the state’s constitution.
“The Wisconsin Constitution expressly charges the Legislature with effectuating the constitutional mandate for tuition free public schools,” the plaintiffs state in the suit. “Notwithstanding this clear constitutional command, the Legislature has failed to ensure that state funding to public school districts has kept pace with the increased educational costs, and the growing gap has imposed an ever-increasing burden on local taxpayers and property tax revenues.”
This suit follows the adjournment of the State Assembly session on Feb. 20, where public school funding was notably absent in any utilization of the state’s $2.4 billion budget surplus.
The suit goes on to list the numerous ways in which Wisconsin public education has seen funding struggles, including, but not limited to, cutting a program that assisted school districts with meeting the needs of impoverished students, spending $800 less per pupil in 2023-2024 adjusted for inflation, than in 2009-2010 and underfunding education of students with disabilities by $1.29 billion.
“The Legislature’s persistent failure to adequately fund public school districts, coupled with decisions to cap school district spending and prioritize funding for private school vouchers and independent charter schools, has driven student outcomes, as measured by proficiency data, into steady decline. And high needs students have suffered the steepest proficiency losses,” the lawsuit argues. “Teachers, administrators, support staff, parents, and students alike are extending themselves beyond the bounds of reasonable expectations to overcome the Legislature’s dereliction. They are doing the best they can with inadequate resources.”
In response to the lawsuit, Vos stated to the Madison Cap Times: “This complaint is another meritless attempt by liberal activists to defund the state’s highly successful school-voucher program and interfere with the Legislature’s authority to fund public schools. We will vigorously defend against this suit and are confident that the courts will soundly reject it.”
