Growth prompts tax request by Pea Ridge School District

Hannah Howell (left) and Kameryn Thomason work on projects in a ceramics class March 15 at Pea Ridge High School. The district will ask voters in May to pay another 5.1 mills annually to build a new high school.
Hannah Howell (left) and Kameryn Thomason work on projects in a ceramics class March 15 at Pea Ridge High School. The district will ask voters in May to pay another 5.1 mills annually to build a new high school.

PEA RIDGE -- The state has pledged to pay more than half the cost of a new high school for the School District if residents agree to a 5.1-mill tax increase on May 9.

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Corra Wilson (left) and Hailey Key work on a music lesson March 15 at Pea Ridge High School.

That proposal, if approved, would raise the district's millage rate to 49.9, making it the highest rate in Arkansas. The Fouke School District in the state's southwest corner now has the highest rate at 49.0 mills.

Growth spurt

It’s still a relatively small school district, but percentage-wise, Pea Ridge has been one of the fastest-growing districts in Arkansas over the past decade. Here’s a look at how enrollment has changed. Numbers are from Oct. 1 of each year.

School yearEnrollmentPercent change from previous year

2007-081,5275.6 percent

2008-091,5592.1 percent

2009-101,5982.5 percent

2010-111,6392.6 percent

2011-121,6953.4 percent

2012-131,685-0.6 percent

2013-141,7503.9 percent

2014-151,8415.2 percent

2015-161,9304.8 percent

2016-172,0667.0 percent

Source: Arkansas Department of Education

Pea Ridge is one of the fastest-growing school districts in the state, "So we have to invest at a different level to keep up with the growth and provide the right future for the students," said Landon Nobles, a 1992 Pea Ridge High School graduate leading the campaign for the millage increase.

Nobles is chief operating officer of Kendal King Group, a marketing firm with a Bentonville office.

The district's enrollment has grown about 40 percent over the past decade and now sits at 2,063. Nobles said enrollment is expected to surpass 3,000 in the next 10 years.

"Which is amazing, when you consider the population of Pea Ridge," he said.

The owner of a $100,000 home would pay $102 more in taxes per year if the proposal passes. Those extra dollars would provide $8.7 million for building and equipping a new high school and remodeling and equipping other school facilities.

The state would pitch in another $10.6 million through the Academic Facilities Partnership Program if voters agree to the millage hike, Nobles said.

The new high school would be about 120,000 square feet and open in time for the 2019-20 school year, according to Superintendent Rick Neal. It will be built on 75 acres on Hayden Road, about a mile north of the current high school. The district bought the land in 2014.

Grade configurations would change. The current high school holds grades nine through 12, but the new one would house grades 10 through 12. The current high school would be converted to a junior high school for grades eight and nine. The middle school, which now holds grades six through eight, will then have only grades six and seven.

Two neighboring districts -- Bentonville and Rogers -- also are holding special elections on May 9 seeking millage increases. Bentonville's millage rate will increase to 48.5 and Rogers' rate will rise to 41.9 if voters approve their requests.

Neal said he believes it's the "perfect timing" for an election, at least for Pea Ridge.

"We were looking at September, too, but looking at the environment and the way Benton County is growing, it gave us some motivation to do the campaign at this point in time," Neal said.

The Vote Yes for Pea Ridge campaign kicked off earlier this month. A campaign website is live at www.yespearidge.com.

The last time the district got a millage increase was in 2007, when voters approved 2.2 additional mills to build Pea Ridge Primary School. Since then the district has invested more than $30 million in facilities without asking for a millage increase, Nobles said.

Included in the plans for the new high school is an auditorium that will be available for use by the community, Nobles said.

Al Fowler, pastor of First Baptist Church Pea Ridge, is among those serving on the campaign committee.

Fowler doesn't have any family members in the district -- his two daughters graduated from the high school in 2000 and 2001 -- but he sees a need for the millage.

"I see it as an appropriate investment not just in the school, but in the community," Fowler said. "Because especially in a community like Pea Ridge, the success of the school is the success of the community. We are very much joined at the hip in that sense."

Pea Ridge doesn't have much industry in town, so the tax base consists mostly of modestly priced homes. That means the district collects less money per mill than its bigger and wealthier neighbors, Bentonville and Rogers, which have more businesses within their borders.

"We're in many ways a bedroom community," Fowler said. "To live in a smaller community versus a larger community, there's some trade-off there. I'm willing to pay a little more for that."

Nobles said he understands some might balk at paying more in taxes, but added the district is doing its best to be good stewards of the community's investment.

Craig Groshans, a Pea Ridge resident since 2001, said on Thursday while dropping by the Post Office that he didn't know much about the upcoming millage election, but was open to supporting it.

"If it helps out the schools, I'm all for it," he said.

District residents who want to vote in the millage election have until April 10 to register.

NW News on 03/26/2017

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