Over the past 10 years, enrollment at Cedar Rapids schools has dipped. At the same time, many of its buildings lack the necessary infrastructure to continue supporting students, and leaders have said they must address mounting maintenance costs in the face of a roughly $12 million budget shortfall.
“We need to elevate ourselves so that when people move here, they can choose any home in the district and be able to have a great experience from a facilities standpoint and also from an educational standpoint,” said Chad Schumacher, the district’s director of operations, in April.
There hasn’t been an easy fix. In 2023, district officials presented voters with a ballot measure asking to build a new middle school and renovate others for a total of roughly $220 million. More than 60% of voters rejected it.
“The district will have some very tough decisions to make going forward,” Superintendent Tawana Grover said at the time. “We still have the same needs we brought from the beginning with this plan.”
In January 2025, the district proposed a $211 million bond. That proposal included renovations for two of its middle schools and the construction of a new middle school. When asked, many families said that proposal would still be too expensive, resulting in an estimated monthly tax increase of $15.45 for the owner of a $200,000 home.
“I am appreciative that this proposal seems more focused on what is necessary instead of just ‘nice to haves’,” said one community member quoted in a statement from the district. “I am open to an increase in taxes to support our schools. However, this proposal’s impact on taxes is still about twice as much as I feel confident supporting in the current economic climate.”
About 33% of respondents to a district-issued survey cited reasons related to the financial burden the bond would place on residents and uncertain economic conditions.
“I do agree with all updates and needs our schools need, unfortunately residents can not afford our taxes to go up,” said one respondent.
“Is there a way to tier this over a set of years, as cost of living keeps going up and it is hard to sustain daily living at times?” asked another.
Community feedback prompts bond revisions
The district revised its proposal in response to the community’s feedback, dropping plans for the new middle school and focusing instead on improving its existing facilities at three middle schools and one high school.
Those revisions allowed the district to cut the total costs associated with its plans nearly in half, to $117 million — the amount that will appear on November's ballot. If passed, the average household in the district would see its taxes increase by just $7.47 a month.
Currently, Cedar Rapids residents pay the least in property taxes of anywhere in Linn County. The bond's passage would elevate Cedar Rapids' property tax rate to the third-lowest, above Central City and North Linn.
The updated referendum would use General Obligation Bonds to fund the following:
- $35 million to renovate Wilson Middle School into an elementary school, including security upgrades and ensuring ADA compliance. Current students would move to Roosevelt Middle School.
- $12 million to support Kennedy High School’s new Freshman Academy programming through renovations expanding common spaces.
- $25 million for renovations at Roosevelt Middle School to house current Roosevelt students and incoming Wilson students, as well as upgrading security and ensuring ADA compliance.
- $45 million for renovations to McKinley STEAM Academy, including security and accessibility upgrades.
Serving the district’s long-term needs
Officials said the bond neatly fits into the district’s Facility Master Plan, which aims to modernize both teaching practices and buildings to meet students’ current needs. Some of its goals include increasing high school graduation rates by 10% and reducing suspensions by the same amount by June 2027.
“When we take a look at our facilities plan, we’re not just looking at the actual physical structures of our buildings,” said Schumacher, the district director of operations. “We’re also looking at how those buildings service the programming and education that are happening within those buildings and across the district.”
The buildings are old — most were built before the 1950s. The three middle schools have historic exteriors with ornate architecture that officials don’t want to tear down. But the buildings' structures are a main focus of the districts' and a big reason why it's bringing the bond to voters.
As the district middle schools battle declining enrollment, Schumacher said the bond will help finance a streamlining effort that will ultimately provide better educational outcomes and opportunities for its students.
“When we have schools that are under-enrolled or lightly enrolled, we’re maybe not able to have a full show choir or full football team or things of that nature,” Schumacher said. “And so that is something that doesn’t allow our kids to have the best experience when they want to participate in that.”
Schumacher added that by moving students from Wilson Middle School to Roosevelt Middle School, the district will save money by removing some existing redundancies.
“If we don’t have a full middle school here and a full middle school here, we’re duplicating some positions that could maybe allow us to better look at how we streamline that,” Schumacher said.
Operational costs for maintaining its existing infrastructure have been getting in the way of the district’s ability to be financially stable. Schumacher said the bond would help officials find ways to be more responsible with taxpayer’s money by freeing up Physical Plant and Equipment Levy (PPEL) funds that the district currently uses for maintenance.
“When we can renovate or replace buildings and get them to be more modern and we’re not spending money on repairs, then we’re able to maybe refocus that PPEL money on other things that would be geared towards those educational experiences,” Schumacher said.
If the bond doesn’t pass, Schumacher said there are Plan B's, C's and D's — but the district won’t turn to those unless it has to. He said that could include revisiting plans for the new middle school.
“We’re optimistic for Nov. 4, but we also have to be realistic that we are going to have to make some decisions on our facilities,” Schumacher said. “I keep saying that the outcome of Nov. 4 will determine our next moves, and if, unfortunately, the bond doesn’t pass, we will have to probably look at all of our buildings.”
Community members unite with local leaders to gain support
Local leaders suggested that the improvements made to each of the four buildings would result in positive outcomes at all the district’s schools, not just the four being directly remodeled.
“This infusion of resources from the bond is going to modernize the buildings so they don’t consume all the maintenance budget, and [the maintenance budget] is able to be redistributed to all the other buildings,” said Ron Corbett, vice president of economic development at the Cedar Rapids Metro Economic Alliance. “So even though these four buildings are on the bond issue, all the buildings will be affected positively if voters say yes.”
The organization has spearheaded a months-long campaign to get voters to approve the bond — an effort that has included tabling at the local farmer’s market and building a coalition of local groups, private citizens and elected leaders who support the referendum.
In August, 20 principals from schools in the district helped the campaign gather 6,730 signatures to place the referendum on the ballot — well over the 5,357 signature threshold.
“It’s not the [Superintendent] Dr. Grover bond issue or the school board bond issue, it’s the community bond issue,” Corbett said. “And there really has been a rallying around it.”
The referendum needs 60% of voters’ approval to pass, a threshold that Corbett admits is high. But he remains optimistic.
“In today’s political environment, where there is a lot of division, it’s really hard to get 60%,” Corbett said. “But we really feel like the community is uniting behind this, and we’re hopeful that we’ll have a successful passage on Nov. 4.”
