A proposed $17 million bond vote failed in the Hampton-Dumont School District during last November’s election.
The measure received 54.15% approval, short of the 60% needed for school bond referendums to pass. RadioOnTheGo News recently spoke with H-D Superintendent Aaron Becker about the failed bond vote and what’s next for the school district.
“It was obviously disappointing for us. We know that there are needs within the district for renovations within our facilities, but it’s also, it’s a community vote. It’s an election that community speaks on. You know, it’s our job to continue to learn from our community members. Uh, the reasons why maybe they voted no, but also, you know, with the 54% this year, but also 55% last year, we know that there’s momentum there. And there are people that feel like the renovations to our facilities are a need. And so we’ll continue to do the work.”
During a work session in December, the Hampton-Dumont School Board discussed the recent bond vote and what the board plans to do in 2025. Becker says there is still a need for improvements at the district.
“I think amongst that discussion, there’s a feeling of yes, those needs are definitely still there. We will work towards the necessary steps to work towards a bond referendum in 2025. Now, what that means, we first have to have a list of projects that we identify, that we would like to put onto a petition for the community to consider and get signatures. So that’s some of the work that we have to do for it to become any type of reality to get towards an election in November of 2025. So we’ve got some work to do, but I think the overall feeling is that the needs are still there and we wanna try to bring it to the community one more time.”
Becker says the petition will need at least 711 signatures, or roughly one-fourth of the total number of votes the bond received during the last election, to move ahead with another possible bond vote in 2025.
