SANDPOINT — Lake Pend Oreille School District officials have proposed $25 million for the district’s next two-year maintenance and operations supplemental levy.

District trustees will vote on the ballot recommendation on Dec. 11 and, in the meantime, are encouraging the public to comment on the proposed levy, of which nearly $21 million is slated for staffing.

“The biggest increase is for our personnel — they are underpaid and I think we need to do more for them,” said LPOSD board chair Cary Kelly.

Kelly said the proposal does not include salary increases for the district superintendent Shawn Woodward or chief financial and operations officer Lisa Hals.

Woodward said in order to “recruit and retain highly effective personnel,” as is outlined under the district’s strategic plan, LPOSD needs to be competitive with other districts in the region. While he outlined some of the salaries in the Spokane and Newport area school districts, which pay up their top staff up to $97,823, Woodward said he was using those as comparison purposes only.

“We are not asking to compete with them from salary standpoint — that is far too high,” Woodward said. “We are asking to be regionally competitive with Rathdrum, Lakeland, Coeur d’Alene, Post Falls.”

Woodward said the goal is to get the top attaining staff up to the $70,000 range. Currently, top attaining LPOSD staff can make up to $65,250.

“In order to recruit and retain talent, we have to pay talent,” said board member Lonnie Williams. “And it’s shown over and over again with all of our metrics, what’s important for student achievement is quality of teachers ... We are on a good trajectory and need to expand on it.”

The levy increase would also allow the district to hire additional staff due to enrollment increases, hire a second school resource officer, maintain elementary counseling support, and increase non-tuition based full-day kindergarten.

About 30 percent of the district’s budget is funded through the maintenance and operations supplemental levy, which goes before voters every two years. In addition to staffing, the funds are primarily distributed among technology, student activities, curriculum and maintenance.

The current $17 million two-year levy expires in June. Currently, the cost to taxpayers per $300,000 with homeowner’s exemption is $27.66 per month, said Lisa Hals, the district’s chief financial and operations officer. Hals projected that cost would that would go up to $36.83, or an additional $9.17 per month if the $25 million levy is approved by voters. If approved, the district would levy uneven amounts over the 2019-2020 fiscal years, at $12,432,435 the first year, and $12,929,732 the second year.

The final meeting for ballot recommendation and resolution is scheduled for 6 p.m., Dec. 11., in the Ponderay Events Center, 401 Bonner Mall Way, and the public is encouraged to attend. The ballot will go before voters on March 12, 2019.

Information on the proposed supplemental levy can be found on the district’s website at lposd.org.

Mary Malone can be reached by email at mmalone@bonnercountydailybee.com and follow her on twitter @MaryDailyBee.