| By Neil Johnson, reporter/anchor, Big Radio |

If Milton School District goes out for another spending referendum in 2024, it’s likely it’d come in the November Presidential election.

The district hasn’t committed to seeking another operating referendum after the one floated in April failed. But most school board members and district administrators said at a board meeting last night they think a spring referendum would be too soon.

Milton School Board member Joe Martin says some on the district’s finance committee think the district crafted the last referendum backwards.

Martin says he believes the district should take more time on the front end of a referendum to see what approach residents want to take.

Milton Schools Superintendent Rich Dahman says he thinks the district should take the time to probe both residents who support and oppose a referendum.

He says timing the referendum for the fall Presidential election would give the district time this winter and early in the spring to craft a question. Under a fall timeline, the board would have to approve a ballot question for the November election by late April.

An early budget outlook presented Tuesday shows Milton School District should be financially stable in the coming school year … but by 2025-2026, the Red Hawks could be running more than $700,000 in the red. That’s when the district reaches a fiscal cliff, because its current operational referendum runs out then, and so does an infusion of extra state funding afforded through COVID-relief money that was intended to help districts bridge budget gaps.

At the same time, the district’s major costs are projected to rise 3% to 4% every year alongside increases each year in per-pupil costs, which could mean a widening budget gap each year.

The district predicts those deficits under a forecast of state shared revenue, tax levy models and local property value forecasts based on state law and its current model of how public schools can be funded. Those are forces all Wisconsin public school systems deal with.

Dahman says if nothing in the near term changes with how the state manages public school funding, Milton Schools and other districts will continue to face budget shortfalls that they now can only address by staffing and educational program cuts or asking taxpayers for extra funding through referendums.