PONDERAY — As the first step in a plan for the future of facilites in the Lake Pend Oreille School District, board members began the process of drafting a survey in hopes of garnering public input regarding the district's failed plant facilities levy in August.

During the Sept. 27 school board meeting, Lisa Hals, the district's chief financial and operations officer, presented board members with a survey option drafted by Moore Information, Inc. After learning the cost for Moore's services would range between $17,000 and $24,000, it was decided by board members not to use the company's services, but rather to draft an in-house survey.

It was decided the draft survey done by Moore, which cost the district $1,800, will be administered by the district rather than Moore and should be available to the public within the next week, said LPOSD Superintendent Shawn Woodward. The purpose of discussion at Tuesday's LPOSD meeting was to decide what questions to keep and what not to keep. Community members present pointed out a few questions that needed to be more specific as well.

"It's called a draft for a reason," Woodward said. "We are not married to any of the questions."

All of the trustees agree the survey is a starting point in a long process of developing a new plant facilities levy proposal in which transparency and public input is of the utmost importance.

Questions in the survey range from whether the survey taker voted in the levy and whether they supported or opposed it, to rating the district’s efforts when it comes to spending education dollars efficiently and preparing students for jobs and college. There is opportunity to elaborate on concerns and complaints about the levy and the process as well.

Some of the question were removed, in part because chairman Steve Youngdahl worried the original might be too lengthy and some may not want to finish the survey. It was also decided some of the questions were irrelevant, such as whether the survey taker visited websites to learn about the levy and which sites they visited.

One area of concern among the community members present at Tuesday's meeting was the "components" section of the survey that breaks down the parts of the previous levy, with individual costs, and asks the survey taker whether they would vote yes or no to each one individually. According to public comment, this gives the impression the district would include rebuilds again rather than considering remodeling schools like Sandpoint Middle School, Northside Elementary and Washington Elementary.

Youngdahl reiterated the questions on the survey are designed to give feedback from the failed levy and "what happened during the election specifically," so district officials and a planning committee can see what went wrong in the past. The same numbers will not be showing up on a new levy, he said. It will be one of the jobs of a new planning committee to obtain accurate and thorough information to compare costs of remodel versus the cost of new schools. Board members agreed a statement of intent at the start of the survey should be added to reduce confusion over the purpose of the survey.

The next step following the survey is to form a new committee.

"(The committee) will have the information from the survey along with the goals and parameters from the board," Youngdahl said. "From time to time (board members) will have some reports. Once something definitive comes out of there, then we will have another survey."

Woodward said there was some public concern over the forming and transparency of the previous committee. Some concern revolves around Woodward, Hals and LPOSD facilities director Matt Diel as committee members.

"I think we can structure the committee in a different way where it can be more of a community driven process in which district staff provide information and support as requested by the committee," Woodward said.