Wake is asking voters for a $680M school loan. Here’s what it would pay for

A proposed $680 million bond for the Wake County Public School System would bring upgrades — everything from renovations to new climate control systems to the removal of trailer classrooms — at schools across the district.

What it doesn't do as much of: Build new schools. That’s a significant change from bonds approved over the past few decades.

The new bond — which county voters can approve or reject on Election Day — is a reflection of new priorities for the state's largest school system: Fixing up existing schools that it had deprioritized in favor of new construction and employee pay raises.

The bond covers the 2027-28 and 2028-29 school years. Just 17% of the funds would likely go toward building new schools, and that money would go only toward planning and initial construction for three schools that would open in 2029 or later. 

Growth has taken off in eastern Wake, and the bond would help address that, school board Chairman Tyler Swanson told WRAL News.

"This bond will go towards that, but also looking at some of the older schools that also needs more tender love and care," Swanson said.

To pay for it, the county would raise taxes on property owners. It would cost an extra $4.10 for every $100,000 in property value. The owner of a $400,000 Wake County home, for instance, would pay $16.40 each year.

Wake County puts a school bond referendum before voters roughly every four years. They’re for facilities only, because bonds can’t legally fund recurring expenses, such as teachers.

In between those referenda, which only cover two years at a time, the county secures loans on its own. Those loans tend to have higher interest rates than referendum-approved bonds because they aren't backed by a separate tax, but taxpayers still pay back those loans, plus interest. 

The county estimates having to pay $363.4 million in interest over the 20-year life of the bond, on top of the $680 million principal bond amount. Based on current rates, interest could be $14 million higher with a same-cost bond funded without the dedicated tax, according to the county.

“Issuing these general obligation bonds is an efficient way [of] keeping cost under control, interest rates under control, etc., to raise the money,” said Gary Greene, a co-chair of Friends of Wake County, a group that’s pushing for the passage of the bond. The repairs need to be done, and they will only become more expensive for taxpayers if they're put off into the future, Greene said.

What's in the bond: HVAC, renovations, student devices and more

The bond language on Wake ballots largely goes over the cost but doesn't list in detail what the expenses would be. 

Those details come from the school board’s capital improvement plan, which lists costs that would be funded by the bond and by the smaller amount of additional county dollars that would be spent on top of that bond.

Here's what the bond would pay for:

Renovations of current schools. About $329.7 million is planned for significant renovations at nine schools. That's a $201 million increase in the renovation plans for the bond years of the 2022 capital improvement plan, the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years, combined.

About 40% of that would go toward a new building for Ligon Magnet Middle School. About half of all of the funds would go toward major renovations at Cary High and East Garner Magnet Middle. The rest would go toward smaller renovations at Briarcliff, Hunter Magnet, Washington Magnet and Wendell Magnet elementary schools; and Athens Drive Magnet and East Wake Magnet high schools.

Replacing HVAC and other equipment. About $98.7 million would go toward replacing infrastructure that's past its useful life, an increase from the 2022 capital improvement plan of $23.7 million during the previous bond years. Roughly half of that would go toward heating, ventilation or air conditioning equipment replacements at nearly two dozen schools, according to the district. It's not clear how that compares to the 2022 capital improvement plan, which doesn't break down HVAC expenses by themselves. Other lifecycle replacements include safety equipment, roofing, parking, fire alarms, elevators, intercom systems and sports facilities.

The district has struggled with malfunctioning HVAC systems in schools — even newer schools with newer systems — for years. Schools, or portions of schools, have been sweltering in the heat or frigid in the cold, and dozens of schools have dismissed students early as a result. 

District officials acknowledge much of that is due to aging equipment, which the bond would help replace, and inadequately maintained equipment. 

The district has about $800 million in deferred maintenance, but maintenance isn’t part of the bond. State law forbids bonds from covering recurring operating expenses. Teacher pay, employees and regular maintenance of facilities come from the annual operating budget, which is comprised of a combination of state, county and federal funds.

Investment in maintenance had fallen off for years as the number of schools and maintenance issues grew faster than the number of maintenance workers, while the school board prioritized other school employees and higher employee pay. 

That’s why Melanie Dubis, another co-chair of Friends of Wake County, said the bond is important. The HVAC systems, among other infrastructure, are outdated, she said.

“They are at the end of their useful life, and they need repair,” Dubis said. “... Students need to be safe, and they need to be comfortable, and they need to be able to focus on learning."

Bob Luebke, the education analyst at Raleigh-based thinktank John Locke Foundation, said it’s clear the district has major HVAC needs but lamented the district hasn’t used other funding opportunities available to it in the past.

Luebke contends the district would be in less of a hole when it comes to HVAC if it had spent some of its temporary federal pandemic stimulus dollars on HVAC. Statewide, state data shows districts spent 5.9% of their funds on HVAC contracts. Wake spent no dollars on HVAC contracts.

If Wake had spent 5.9% of its $434.2 million in stimulus dollars on HVAC contracts, it would have spent $25.6 million on HVAC.

"The issue for HVAC has been around for several years," Luebke said. "You can go back three, four years, and just scroll through news articles in May or August of the year, and find issues on HVAC problems in Wake County public schools. So the issue has been problematic, and it hasn't been really resolved, and that's a problem. It's getting worse."

The Wake County Republican Party opposes the Wake school bond in part because it thinks the school board should have prioritized previous funding to solve HVAC problems. “The school board gets billions and cannot seem to fund classroom supplies and HVAC systems,” the Wake GOP said in a statement to WRAL News.

A spokesperson for Wake schools didn’t answer questions about why the district chose not to spend any of the funds on HVAC contracts.

Compared to other districts, Wake spent more on employees.

Laptops and technology. About $59.2 million would go toward technological devices. That's a bit more than the $52.2 million included in the 2022 capital improvement plan for the previous bond years. Some of that will go toward replacing student devices, despite several board members and many parents urging the district to reconsider whether to issue devices to students in its lowest grade levels. The district hasn't decided how or whether to change its device strategy for the youngest grade levels but has been conducting surveys and consulting with staff.

"We believe the decision should be guided first by instructional needs and what is developmentally appropriate for our youngest learners, while also considering staff feedback, student screen time, equity, and fiscal responsibility," the school district said in a statement to WRAL News. The district plans to establish a new strategy for devices by December. The district doesn't have to follow its current version of its capital improvement plan, which is what calls for the $59.2 million investment, if it changes course in the coming months.

New schools. $143.2 million would go toward planning and initial construction at three different new elementary schools in eastern Wake, where enrollment growth is still expected. They include Marshburn Road Elementary in Wendell, Poole Road Elementary in east Raleigh and Little Creek Elementary in Zebulon.

That dollar amount compares to $337 million toward new schools in the 2022 capital improvement plan's bond years, just more than half of all expenses in the 2022 plan.

In the past, greater shares of capital improvement plans would go toward building new schools than in the current one, as enrollment in the district swelled, with dozens of overcrowded schools and hundreds of mobile classroom trailers housing the extra students it couldn’t fit inside the main school buildings.

Currently, 18 schools are still so crowded that they don't accept families who are new to the area, and the district still has hundreds of trailer classrooms across the county, some that are decades old.

But the district is no longer growing at a significant rate and some years doesn't grow at all. It's no longer expected to grow much in the next decade, either, as more students enroll in other types of schools and as birthrates and in-migration slow.

Proposed school reassignments for next year are intended in part to alleviate crowding at some schools, moving students from overcrowded schools to less-crowded ones.

Part of the bond would get rid of or move some of the trailer classrooms.

Trailer classrooms. About $6.5 million would go toward trailer classrooms, including getting rid of them, renovating them or moving some from schools that no longer need them to schools that do. That compares to $5.9 million in the 2022 capital improvement plan's bond years.

Last school year, the district had 943 mobile classrooms, accounting for 10% of the district's entire classroom space, according to the district. Some of those were contained within the same trailer and some trailers had only one classroom. The vast majority of the trailers will remain, even after the 2028 and 2029 projects.

3 more bonds before voters

At the same time voters will consider the $680 million Wake school bond, they'll also consider a $149.1 million bond for Wake Technical Community College. Raleigh residents will also vote on two bonds of $101.5 million each for transportation and housing, though the city bonds wouldn't come with tax increases. The Town of Knightdale has a $55 million parks and recreation bond on the ballot, costing $35 for every $100,000 of assessed property value.

The Wake County Democratic Party has endorsed all of them, while the Wake County Republican Party is opposed to all of them.

County Democrats say the bonds would make investments in schools and communities, while county Republicans say municipalities need to scale back.

The Wake Tech bond would pay for expanded academic programs in several trades, including public safety; facility renovations at Wake Tech's southern campus; and facility and equipment upgrades across campuses. It would cost a Wake taxpayer $0.90 for every $100,000 of property value annually.

Raleigh says it doesn't need a tax increase for its bonds because it began saving for them last year.

More than half of Raleigh's housing bond would cover affordable housing development and preservation. The rest would cover homebuyer assistance, development on city land and homelessness response.

Raleigh's transportation bond would cover three road projects, expanded biking and walking networks, and traffic safety efforts on neighborhood roads.