Students canvass for Kalispell Public Schools high school levy
Mar. 28—Students from Flathead and Glacier high schools are making sure their voices are heard by the voters who will decide a $2.97 million levy request in May that will affect their education.
Three students from One Brave Pack, a political action committee composed of students, parents and business leaders, shared how they have been canvassing for "Yes" votes on Kalispell Public Schools' proposed high school general fund levy through social media and door-to-door visits with taxpayers.
"Our goal is to hit 1,000 homes in like the Kalispell proper area," Glacier High School junior Josh Lee said.
Lee and Flathead High School juniors Vikram Vatti and Mitchell Johnson, who arrived straight from a track practice, sat down for an interview recently at the offices of McGarvey Law, which serves as One Brave Pack's headquarters. Lee and Vatti said they began mobilizing classmates at their respective schools and joined forces when they learned about each other's efforts.
The high school general fund levy seeks to cover a budget shortfall and fully fund the high school district, which encompasses Flathead, Glacier, the H.E. Robinson Agricultural Center and Linderman Education Center, the alternative high school. The high school district is currently 90% funded, according to officials.
The general fund is the main budget that covers costs related to operating schools, such as salaries, instructional materials, student support services, utilities and extracurriculars not covered by the student activities fund, for example.
The three students agreed there is more awareness of this levy among the student body because of what's at stake if it doesn't pass.
"With so much on the line a lot more students are having it brought to their attention. Teachers are talking about it a lot more and my circle of friends," Lee said. "There's been a lot of word of mouth [and] people talking about the levy."
What's on the line is a reduction of 20.5 full-time equivalent positions in the high school district, which will primarily be achieved through attrition (retirements and resignations). Positions are also being eliminated in the elementary district. Staff cuts will in turn affect the number of classes/sections that can be offered.
As a member of Flathead's speech and debate team, Johnson said the impetus to join One Brave Pack and advocate for the levy's passage came after learning longtime speech and debate head coach and English teacher, Shannon O'Donnell, and assistant coach and history teacher, Sean O'Donnell, are retiring. KPS offered a retirement incentive to all staff under the looming budget shortfall.
"They gathered us up all before state and basically told us about the retirement and I was really upset about it, and I left the room. I knew I had to do something about it because I don't think it's OK that teachers have to give up their job and give up what they love ..." Johnson said.
"... When you have teachers like that who choose to retire just to try to save younger teachers that's something that should never be happening, right, like we should have the community caring and investing," added Vatti, who is also on the speech and debate team.
The district is also proposing phasing out legacy programs if the levy doesn't pass. Legacy programs are what Kalispell Public Schools' is calling programs and extracurriculars that have been offered to generations of high school students including athletics, FFA, speech and debate, theater, trades classes (house construction, welding and mechanics), internships, apprenticeships and music.
"[Kalispell Public Schools] offers a lot of extra opportunities to students, a lot more than other school districts do, and yet, we're the lowest funded AA school district in the state," Lee said.
In addition to a diploma, high school students may obtain college credit, career-specific certifications and work experience. The students said this gives them a head start in their pursuits after graduation.
Vatti views extracurriculars as an integral part of students' education. Sports games, music concerts, theater performances, speech and debate tournaments, county fair participation and volunteering through the extracurriculars all serve as a place for students to showcase their talent while providing a source of community entertainment.
"There's a lot of ways to look at the levy, but I think the main way to look at it is that it's about freedom. It's about giving freedom to our children, our youth within the community, to be able to do what they want with their lives," Vatti said.
"I agree. That's a good way of putting it," Lee said. "Voting yes on the levy is really like voting yes for students to be able to have a choice to do the things they care about, do the things they enjoy and the things they want to do to become not only better students, but better community members in the future ... voting for a better future for students."
People who can vote on the high school general fund levy includes residents in Kalispell and 13 surrounding elementary school districts whose students feed into Glacier and Flathead.
If the $2.97 million high school levy is approved, owners of homes with assessed values of $200,000 can anticipate annual taxes to increase by about $33.04. Owners of homes with assessed values of $300,000 can expect annual taxes to increase by $49.56.
"It's $73[.80] a year for the average home," Lee said, referring to the estimated tax increase on a home valued at $447,000.
"The average home is paying $6 a month. I mean, that's one trip to Starbucks. That is less than a Netflix subscription. That's less than a Spotify subscription," he added.
Vatti urged residents to reinvest in their community with a "yes" vote.
"I would say to people who are anti-tax in general is, out of all the things you can spend your money on, this has to be very important. You are directly helping our community. You are investing in the youth who are going to run the businesses that are within the Flathead Valley in the future.
A high school levy hasn't passed since May 2007. In the years since, the high school district footprint has grown along with academic programming. In 2024, voters shot down a $700,000 high school general fund levy request, which would have cost taxpayers who owned a $300,000 home about $12 annually.
Historically, Kalispell Public School's last major budget cut was $1.5 million that went into effect over 2017 and 2018. Of that amount, about $866,291 was cut from the high school budget alone. To cover budget shortfalls and inflationary increases, the district has also used money in an interlocal fund.
Rather than tap into one-time funding in the interlocal fund to cover ongoing costs, Kalispell Public Schools has pivoted strategies under a new administration and school board in efforts to stop pushing the problem down the road. The interlocal fund, which is a savings account of sorts, contains a combination of high school and elementary funds, (primarily any remaining year-end money). Currently it holds $5.77 million — with portions of it earmarked for items such as textbook purchases and replacing the artificial turf at Legends Stadium, for example.
"What I've been telling people is, imagine if you had to work with the amount of money that you had 17 years ago and you were just out of college, right, you just got your first apartment and you had a certain amount of money. Now, you have a full family with three kids and you're trying to live in a bigger home to accommodate all those people — but with the same amount of money you had 17 years ago. It just doesn't work," Lee said.
The three said anyone interested in joining their efforts can, whether it's canvassing or putting up a yard sign. People may join One Brave Pack's efforts by filling out a form at https://onebravepack.org.
For more information about the levy visit Kalispell Public Schools www.sd5.k12.mt.us.
Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Russia used Grad rocket artillery in deadly Sumy attack on 3 June
Russian forces used a 122 mm BM-21 Grad multiple-launch rocket system, with a range of up to 40 km, to strike the city of Sumy on 3 June. Source: Ukrainska Pravda article: Are you advancing on Tyotkino? We're tripping over the same mistake: What's happening in Sumy as Russian forces push forward (English translation coming soon) Details: On the morning of 3 June, Russian forces attacked cars at traffic lights in central Sumy, killing three people. Three others – a 17-year-old, an 86-year-old woman and a 43-year-old man – died in hospital. The man's 7-year-old daughter, Masha, was transferred to Okhmatdyt Children's Hospital in Kyiv with shrapnel in her lungs. Local media, Sumy Oblast Military Administration and later President Volodymyr Zelenskyy initially reported that the Russians likely fired on the city with long-range rocket artillery. On social media, Sumy residents and journalists speculated it could have been a Russian Tornado MLRS, with a range of 120 km, suggesting no new threat to the city had emerged and urging calm. However, Ukrainska Pravda reports this is likely incorrect. Our sources in a law enforcement agency, later confirmed by the Office of the Prosecutor General, indicate the attack involved a BM-21 Grad, with a range of 20-40 kilometres. Russian forces used 122 mm extended-range 9M521 rockets in the city centre. These highly-explosive fragmentation rockets are designed for use against infantry, unarmoured, or lightly armoured vehicles. Fired from Grad or the upgraded Tornado-G systems, a single salvo can launch up to 40 rockets, each containing around 1,000 fragments. The maximum range is 40 km. BM-21 Grad MLRS Stock photo: Russian webpages Sources in law enforcement told Ukrainska Pravda that the Grad strike had been launched from Russian territory, confirming no heavy equipment, artillery, or MLRS is present in Russian-occupied villages in Sumy Oblast. Measuring 30-40 kilometres from the strike point in Sumy, the Grad system was likely positioned in Russian villages such as Sinyak, Kulbaki, or Novoivanovka to the north, or Guevo or Gornali to the east. Where could the Russian BM-21 Grad that attacked Sumy on 3 June 2025 have been located? Source: Ukrainska Pravda; DeepStateMap, an interactive map of hostilities in Ukraine Quote: "What are we saying here? The Russians managed to position a Grad system near the border and open fire, while Ukrainian units failed to detect or neutralise it. This represents a new level of risk for Sumy." More details: Nevertheless, the rocket artillery strikes on Sumy have not yet become widespread, suggesting the 3 June attack may have been an attempt to intimidate civilians and pressure Ukraine into negotiation compromises. The implication appears to be: "We're hitting Sumy with MLRS; you risk losing more if you don't meet our terms." However, even Russia's most severe attacks on Sumy, Kyiv, or other cities have not shifted Ukraine's resolve. They only strengthen Ukrainians' determination to defend their cities. Support Ukrainska Pravda on Patreon!
Miami Herald
35 minutes ago
- Miami Herald
Separated from kids in Cuba and Haiti by Trump travel ban, parents plead for help
As Cubans on both sides of the Florida Straits come to terms with what a new U.S. travel ban means for their families' hopes to reunite, many have flocked to social media in anguish — including children — seeking help. 'President Trump, I ask you to please reconsider family reunification for residents,' said a 10-year-old in a Hello Kitty T-shirt in a video she recorded in Havana. The video was published by her mother, Lia Llanes, a U.S. permanent resident living in Miami, in one of the several Facebook groups where Cubans are discussing the new prohibitions. 'I am a child who, like many others, is waiting for an interview to reunite with our parents so we can grow up in this beautiful country and become a citizen,' the child says in the video. 'With great pride, I ask you again, please reconsider. And I ask God to enlighten you. Thank you.' The child had been taking English lessons, preparing for a new life in the United States, which she thought was just days away, Llanes told the Herald. The petition to bring her daughter to the U.S. had just been approved in late May, and the family was just waiting for the visa interview at the U.S. embassy in Havana, the final step in a lengthy process to legally emigrate to the United States. Then President Donald Trump announced last week a travel ban suspending the issuing of immigrant visas to Cuban relatives of U.S. permanent residents, upending the plans of many families to reunite. 'It's very heartbreaking to know that your claim is approved and this happens,' said Llanes, who runs a small business and obtained a green card after being paroled at the U.S. border in 2022. She said her daughter spent two days 'without talking to anyone' after learning the bad news. 'It's hard to explain,' she said. 'It's strange because you have your daughter there, and you're here, and one minute, you have good news, and then the next, everything changes.' Trump's new ban restricts travel for most citizens of Cuba, Venezuela and five other countries while also placing Haiti and 11 other nations on a full ban. It's a distressing blow to families who had already been waiting years to reunite in the United States. Standing in a room full of boxes with the beds she hoped her children would sleep on when they join her in the United States, Clara Yoa, a U.S. permanent resident, could barely contain her tears as she recounted how she felt after learning about the travel ban. 'I no longer have a life,' she said in a video she published on Facebook. Yoa came to the United States in 2019 from Cuba, and has her own small cleaning company in Tampa, she told the Herald. Like Llanes' daughter, her children, now 16, 17, and 19, were also waiting for the visa interview at the U.S. Embassy in Havana. But their arrival had become an urgent matter because her own mother, who has been caring for Yoa's three children in Granma, a province in eastern Cuba, has metastatic cancer. Adding to her desperation is that a Cuban doctor told her that due to the stress caused by their separation, her eldest now has a heart condition. 'I hope that the people at the top, those who sign and pass the laws, also take into account that we, permanent residents, also have our children in a prison country, and we want to have them here with us,' she said, her voice breaking in the video. 'At least they should take into account that there are children who aren't going to come here to commit terrorism or harm this country.' The ban, announced last Wednesday, suspends immigration visas for adult children of U.S. citizens and relatives of U.S. permanent residents from the 19 countries included in the executive order. Only the immediate relatives of U.S. citizens–parents, spouses, parents and minor children will be allowed to enter the United States under a directive the White House said will 'protect the United States from foreign terrorists and other national security and public safety threats.' Cubans, Haitians and Venezuelans with visas issued before June 8 will still be able to travel to the United States. But on Monday, some relatives of U.S. permanent residents who attended scheduled visa interviews at the U.S. embassy in Havana were issued a document in Spanish stating they were not 'eligible for an immigrant visa' under the new directive, a decision they could not appeal. The document also stated that their cases did not merit an exception, citing U.S. national security interests. The State Department did not say if applicants whose immigration visas were denied solely based on the new travel restrictions would have a chance down the line to present their case again. It also did not say if cases involving young children would fall under exceptions the Secretary of State can make on a case-by-case basis. But an agency spokesperson said, 'Urgent humanitarian medical travel may be considered a basis for such an exception. Only applicants otherwise qualified for a visa will be considered.' On Wednesday, a mother with a Miami cellphone number joined a WhatsApp chat group for Cubans with pending immigration cases, wanting to know if anyone had heard of a child being denied an immigration visa at the U.S. embassy in Havana. Her child has a scheduled interview later this week. 'I am just talking to him, and he is so innocent, so oblivious about all this, and he will be very happy tomorrow at his appointment,' she said, crying in a voice message. One of the group's most active commenters replied: 'God is great. Perhaps when they see that little boy in there, they would approve it.' A historic exodus Many families left separated by the ban were part of a historic exodus from Cuba, Haiti and Venezuela in recent years. In introducing the travel ban, Trump partly blamed the Biden administration for allowing more than a half million Cubans, Haitians, Nicaraguans and Venezuelans into the United States under a humanitarian parole program that allowed nationals of the four nations to migrate to the U.S. for two years as long as they had a financial sponsor, passed background checks and arrived through an airport. But part of the reason so many people from the four countries took advantage of the program, known as CHNV, stems from legal immigration hurdles and restrictive policies introduced by Trump during his first term. Among other things, his administration suspended the Cuba Family Reunification Program and a similar one for Haitians. During those years, U.S. embassies in the three countries either suspended visa processing or scaled back appointments, preventing people from immigrating legally while their populations faced political and humanitarian crises, which contributed to the historic exodus Trump is now citing. Anguish and uncertainty Since Trump signed his proclamation last Wednesday, Cubans in the U.S. and on the island have been debating and sharing information about the new immigration restrictions on several groups on WhatsApp and Facebook. Many are praying for a 'miracle' as they share their stories and give each other hope that the ban might be temporary. The directive states that after three months of its enactment, the President will review the recommendations by the Secretary of State regarding whether to continue the restrictions on nationals of the targeted countries. A review will be conducted every six months thereafter. But the lifting of restrictions relies on the foreign governments improving 'their information-sharing and identity-management protocols and practices.' So far, the Cuban government has not signaled it is interested in improving its cooperation with the U.S. and instead attacked Secretary of State Marco Rubio. After the travel ban was announced, Cuba's foreign minister said the measure 'aims to deceive the American people, blaming and violating the rights of migrants. Anti-Cuban politicians, including the Secretary of State, are the main proponents of this measure, betraying the communities that elected them.' Trump's proclamation also notes Cuba remains on the U.S. list of countries that sponsor terrorism. The ban also comes at especially difficult time for Haitians in a country wracked by gang violence. In a statement, Haiti's U.S.-backed Transitional Presidential Council said it plans to 'initiate negotiations and technical discussions' with the Trump administration in order to remove Haiti from the targeted countries. This is likely a tall order considering that more than 1.3 million Haitians remain displaced and armed gangs, now in control of most of Port-au-Prince, have made it difficult to circulate, raising questions about authorities' ability to improve vetting procedures and information sharing with the U.S. For Haiti, the ban prohibits the entry of all of its nationals unless they fall under the few exceptions contemplated in the new directive. Like many Haitians who arrived back in the U.S. on the first day of the travel ban, Eraus Alzime, 71, didn't fully understand its impact. The father of 10 was in Haiti visiting his children when he received a call urging him to get back to the U.S. To get out, he had to travel by bus and went through three gang checkpoints, he said. 'Of course you feel panicked,' Alzime said. 'The bandits make you get off so that they check your suitcases and see what you are carrying. You don't have a choice, you have to do it, if you don't you can end up dead.' Alzime, a U.S. citizen, said he applied for six of his children to emigrate to the U.S legally. The oldest is 43 years-old while the youngest is 14. His adult children won't be able to travel to the United States under the current ban. 'I filed for my kids and they've yet to give them to me,' he said. A victim of the country's incessant violence, Alizme says he has no choice but to travel to Haiti for his kids. 'I have to go see how they are doing,' he said. 'We live depressed' As the news about the travel ban sinks in, parents worry about the psychological toll the prolonged separation will have on their children, especially those who are too young to grasp immigration policy. Gleydys Sarda, 26, and her husband took the difficult decision to flee Cuba and left their 3-year-old son under the care of his grandparents in 2022. They didn't want to expose him to what they knew could be a dangerous land journey to the U.S. Southern border, she said. Now, he is 6 years-old, under the care of a grandparent and increasingly anxious to be with his parents. 'We live depressed because of the long wait; we ran out of excuses to tell him when he asks why he cannot be with us,' said Sardá, who is a U.S. permanent resident and works for Amazon at a warehouse in Coral Springs. 'Lately, he has been repeating more than ever that he wants to be here, that he is tired of waiting, and now this restriction broke our hearts. We have no other way.' Sardá's visa petition to bring him to the United States has yet to be approved. The couple tried to bring him using the special parole program created by the Biden administration, but they never heard back from U.S. immigration authorities. Sardá, who is currently pregnant, frets at the idea of traveling to Cuba to see her child, which currently seems to be her only choice to spend time with him, if only for a short time. The last time she visited in January, 'the goodbye was too hard. When we are there, the three of us are very happy, but after we leave,I feel I leave him worse,' she said. Sarda said the boy got depressed after they left, 'and so do we. I was in bed and didn´t want to go to work or leave the house.' 'Now I am also expecting my second child, and it would break my heart to go to Cuba with one child, return with one and leave the other in Cuba.'
UPI
an hour ago
- UPI
North Korea appears to stop loudspeaker broadcasts toward the South
North Korea appears to have stopped broadcasting loud noises along border areas with the South, Seoul's Joint Chiefs of Staff said Thursday. The move came one day after South Korea suspended propaganda loudspeaker broadcasts at the DMZ. File Photo by Thomas Maresca/UPI | License Photo SEOUL, June 12 (UPI) -- North Korea appears to have stopped broadcasting loud noises towards the South, Seoul's military said Thursday, one day after South Korea halted its anti-Pyongyang loudspeaker campaign near the demilitarized zone. "Today, there were no areas where North Korea's noise broadcasts to the South were heard," the Joint Chiefs of Staff said in a text message to reporters. The North had been broadcasting bizarre noises such as metallic screeching and animal sounds since last year, as Cold War-style provocations escalated along the inter-Korean border. Newly elected South Korean President Lee Jae-myung has vowed to lower tensions with Pyongyang, and on Wednesday ordered the suspension of the South's propaganda broadcasts of K-pop, news and information across the border. Lee's office said that the move was made "to ease the military standoff between the South and the North and to open the way to restoring mutual trust." It was also meant to "alleviate the suffering of residents in border areas who have suffered due to North Korea's noise broadcasts," spokeswoman Kang Yoo-jung said in a briefing Wednesday. Seoul resumed the propaganda broadcasts roughly one year ago in response to a series of provocations by North Korea that included floating thousands of trash-filled balloons across the border. Lee, who won a snap election on June 3 to replace impeached former President Yoon Suk Yeol, vowed during his campaign to suspend the loudspeaker broadcasts as well as prevent defector groups from floating balloons with anti-Pyongyang leaflets and USB drives over the border. On Thursday, Lee pledged to swiftly restore communication channels with the North. "We will stop wasteful hostilities and resume dialogue and cooperation," he said in a speech marking the 25th anniversary of the first inter-Korean summit between former South Korean President Kim Dae-jung and North Korean leader Kim Jong Il. "We will restore the crisis management system that prevents accidental clashes and avoids heightening tensions," Lee said in the speech, which was read on his behalf by a senior official at a commemorative event in Seoul. "To this end, we will strive to quickly restore the inter-Korean dialogue channels." The two Koreas reestablished a military hotline in 2018 during a period of detente. However, the North stopped answering the daily calls in 2023 as relations soured amid expanded U.S.-South Korea joint military exercises and a hardline stance by former President Yoon.
