WATER MATTERS: INCREASE ISLAND DISTRICTS REGIONALIZATION RATE + RAISE THE LEVY LID

Olympia has chosen to ignore the higher housing prices and cost of living for our island educators. In 2018 the Washington State Legislature increased funding to school districts to address higher costs of living in the state by providing a regionalization factor based on housing values in the surrounding areas. When island districts were regionalized, the water was not taken into consideration and our districts were regionalized with mainland districts that have housing prices that are half our costs.  When you combine this move with the Levy Lid cap, each of our districts loses up to $500k per year. Seattle schools hired lobbyists to get their levy lids raised. We think our children are important as Seattle's! Please urge our representatives to re-calculate regionalization and raise the levy lid, enabling our island districts to afford, retain, and recruit teachers. NOW IS OUR TIME TO TAKE ACTION as the legislature re-visits regionalization this term. STEP UP AND BE HEARD. EVERY VOICE COUNTS!