During a Monday, Oct. 27, workshop, Battle Ground Public Schools leaders, staff and board members wrestled with what another failed levy attempt would mean for local programs, from counseling and literacy to career and technical education, and what’s at stake as the district prepares to hear another levy proposal next month.
The district’s current 2025-26 school year budget includes $14 million in cuts to staffing and programs after voters rejected the district’s replacement levy earlier this year. Reductions include eliminating all middle school sports and coaching positions, ending free school supplies for primary students, cutting the Kindergarten Jump Start program, removing all instructional coaches and teacher librarians, reducing paid crossing guards, mental health therapists and nursing positions, consolidating bus routes, and suspending new curriculum purchases. The district reduced, but did not fully eliminate, its ASPIRE magnet program by cutting the third-grade cohort.
During an Aug. 25 meeting, Chief Financial Officer Michelle Scott told the board that without passage of a new local levy next year, the district will run a negative ending fund balance by 2026-27. To prevent insolvency, more than $20 million in further cuts would be required.
Last week, Superintendent Shelly Whitten told the board the district has already cut deeply since its last levy failure and warned that another loss would force reductions far beyond enrichment programs.
“We have been working on it for a number of weeks to identify the money, and we are struggling to put anything else on the list,” she said. “We're at $12 million, and we're struggling to find anything else that we think is even feasible that could make any sense whatsoever to cut. Those include pretty much everything that you heard from tonight in one manner or another, being cut or that money being moved to some other place.”
During the meeting, career and technical education (CTE)) Partner Derek Huegel highlighted how the district’s CTE classes have helped students find viable career paths outside traditional college routes. The district’s 80-acre Center for Agriculture, Science and Environmental Education (CASEE) campus has offered such programs in different employment fields for years.
“We need to have career-ready students, and your career might be a college education, but that is so slim relative to all of the jobs that are out there,” Huegel said. “From cooks to firefighters to carpenters, plumbers, electricians, HVAC technicians, there are so many trades that, in my opinion, there should be way more emphasis than we already do have for these CTE classes.”
Although CTE has typically been safe from cuts, that might change if local funding doesn't return. Whitten said the district might have to look into CTE program cuts in the future to address security or faculty staffing if it faces more budget cuts.
“We’ve had to reach in a little, we will have to reach into the max should we not regain some of those levy dollars,” she explained. “It would be a shame for us to build a new construction trade program … and then not have students to fill it because we also would not be able to run courses at the low levels that we typically have.”
She said welding and automotive courses, which sometimes run with as few as 13-18 students for safety reasons, could be forced to double in size if the district must absorb more costs from the general fund.
Campus safety and nursing were among the other major concerns discussed during the workshop. Prairie High School Principal Stephanie Watts said the presence of deputies and security staff has been important, and that staff have noticed a change since positions were removed.
“I'll say speaking to ... not having the additional security, we've had more fights in our building, this year than we've ever had, since I've been at Prairie, and it's only the end of October,” she said. “The ability to be present in all locations is the hard part.”
District security supervisors Mike Michaud and Travis Drake added that the district’s security staff are spread across multiple campuses and that reductions have increased strain on remaining personnel.
Nurse Lindsay Ross highlighted the volume of medical needs the district handles, noting specific requirements for medically fragile students. Ross described the range of school nursing responsibilities, including medication administration, emergency action plans, hearing and vision screening, home-hospital coordination and the staffing strain created when fewer nurses must cover more students.
Student representatives Toby Nguyen and Itzel Contreras-Montiel testified about athletics and activities, especially the role of middle school sports and C-team programs as entry points for students. Both students expressed concern that further cuts may lead to the closure of a C team, closing opportunities for more students to participate in sports.
“One of my close friends started on the C team last year. And this year he made it to the top of varsity in one year,” Nguyen said.
He and Contreras-Montiel argued that losing C-team opportunities would reduce participation, limit access for students who can’t afford club sports and ultimately weaken the district’s athletic programs.
Looking ahead
The board’s next work session, scheduled for Nov. 10, will focus on specific levy options and funding scenarios.
Board director Terry Tate said he was impressed by the information shared this week but wished the discussion hadn’t been so compressed.
“When our counselors don’t have time to talk and when our nurses don’t have time to talk, we’ve missed the boat,” Tate said. “We pushed through a lot of stuff … I’m concerned about what the community would glean from this meeting.”
He added that the next session will be crucial to show the public “the urgency of what we need to do to make sure we don’t lose these steps.”
After the meeting, Tate told The Reflector he found the session “like no other meeting I’ve seen,” while expressing some disappointment in the audience turnout.
“It was wonderful,” he said. “I think our new superintendent has really begun to roll out some amazing ideas. It’s unfortunate that people don’t come, but we’re headed in a good direction…I thought it was very informative.”
As the district prepares its next levy proposal, Whitten urged the board to choose whether to try to restore funding to pre-levy-loss levels.
“We know what we went out for when we put the levy out last year and that was to maintain the programs that we had. It wasn't to add,” Whitten said. “You need to decide: is where we're at right now OK? Or do we want to be where we were at? Because should we not pass a third time, we're going to be faced with cuts.”
