Wrightstown schools urge absentee voting

By Ed Byrne

The Brillion News

WRIGHTSTOWN – The $28.7 million referendum to add on to Wrightstown’s elementary and middle school buildings and upgrade infrastructure at all three of the public schools is still on for the April 7 spring general election.

But the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic has made some changes to how the Wrightstown schools are presenting the referendum.

At the March 25 school board meeting, Superintendent Carla Buboltz said information on the referendum – which had been displayed prominently on the district website’s home page – was pulled.

“We suspended any social media posts related to [the referendum] for the last two weeks, [and] we pulled the last mailing,” Buboltz said.

The final open house presentation to district residents, on March 26, was cancelled.

Instead, the district is promoting absentee voting for the April 7 election.

“There’s a strong, hard push for requesting your absentee ballot to make sure that you vote,” Buboltz said.

The district also got lucky. District IT staffers videotaped the last public forum on the referendum, and that video is posted on-line at https://www.wrightstown.k12.wi.us/referendum/.

“Everything is out there,” Buboltz said.

School board president Mike Van Eperen encouraged people to request absentee ballots as soon as possible.

The pandemic’s effect on the stock and bond markets has also dropped interest rates for bonding.

The school district referendum assumed an interest rate of four percent on the bonds for the $28.7 million needed.

Instead, the interest rate is likely to be much lower.

“We would, right now, borrow at below one percent,” Buboltz said.

She said lower interest costs could drop the estimated impact of the referendum on school property tax rates. The projected rate was 64 cents for thousand of equalized valuation.

~ A complete story on the March 25 school board meeting will appear in the April 2 print edition of The Brillion News.