Looking back at 2021, I consider Nov. 2 one of the most important days of the year in Arkansas.
On Sept. 14, Little Rock voters went to the polls and overwhelmingly voted against a one-cent sales tax proposal for the city. With 62 percent opposing the initiative, observers of politics in the state's largest city predicted that upcoming proposals from the Central Arkansas Library System and Little Rock School District were in trouble.
Those observers were wrong. The CALS and LRSD proposals passed easily. CALS long has been regarded as one of the finest library systems in this part of the country and enjoys strong public support. That vote for a millage increase didn't surprise me.
The pleasant surprise was the fact that 75 percent of voters on Nov. 2 supported a millage extension to raise $300 million for LRSD construction projects. The vote extended the current 12.4 debt service mills by 19 years to 2052.
Here's what capital city voters seemed to say during the fall: "We still love Little Rock. We're proud to have a quality library system and also want to support public schools. But we don't necessarily trust those at City Hall. We're not willing to give the city more hard-earned tax dollars until it shows it can take care of the basics and clean up a Little Rock Police Department that appears to be in disarray."
It wasn't long ago that it was LRSD that looked to be in disarray. That fact makes the 75 percent all the more remarkable.
LRSD had asked voters in 2017 and 2020 for an extended millage. The proposals were defeated during an era when the district was operating under state control without a locally elected board. The current board was elected late last year.
Skip Rutherford, the Arkansas political expert who once was president of the Little Rock School Board, called it "the most significant and impactful election win for the district since voters approved an 8-mill increase in 1990."
Little Rock School Board member Ali Noland said: "This victory was the culmination of our fight to regain local control of the district. It shows that the community was always ready to support our schools. They simply wanted to have a meaningful say in how their tax money would be spent."
In a guest column for the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, Noland wrote: "Our school board has been in place less than a year, but in that time we have not only gotten the district out of state control, we have taken bold steps to keep our students and employees safe from covid-19 and have budgeted for a significant three-year pay raise."
Wth the extra $300 million, LRSD will rebuild what had been McClellan High School to create a K-8 school to replace Cloverdale Middle School. The district will also construct a performing arts center at Parkview Arts and Science Magnet High School, build an auditorium and field house at Central High School, and remove portable classrooms at Central. There also will be a new high school in west Little Rock that could serve up to 1,200 students.
"West Little Rock residents have pushed for such a school for more than a decade, and it makes sense ... to meet this growing need in order to maintain healthy enrollment numbers," Noland wrote. "West Little Rock is an area of rapid population growth where our elementary and middle schools are at capacity.
"But the district currently loses students at the high school level because we don't offer a traditional zoned high school with sports and extracurriculars that is conveniently located for those families."
The district plans to spend $85 million at McClellan, $85 million in west Little Rock, $8.5 million at Central for the fieldhouse and auditorium, $1.5 million at Parkview and $55 million to remove portable classrooms across the district.
Noland noted that the $300 million also will fund "upgrades to school roofs, playground equipment, lighting, flooring and parking lots across the district. These maintenance projects may not sound exciting, but they are vital and necessary."
I say that Nov. 2 was important for all of Arkansas because the state can never achieve its full potential unless its capital city is vibrant. For years, I've heard people who work in Little Rock but don't live in the city say the two issues that keep them commuting are crime (or perceptions thereof) and the condition of public schools.
On the same day voters approved the LRSD proposal, nearby voters approved a Pulaski County Special School District initiative to refinance its current debt and issue new bonds to generate $80 million for expansions and renovations. That proposal received 64 percent voter approval.
Now that LRSD and PCSSD have run successful campaigns, the next thing that must happen in central Arkansas is eliminating the "we versus them" divide between public school advocates and those with children in private schools. A region as large as the Little Rock metro area needs to offer new arrivals as wide a range of choices as possible.
Private school supporters should gladly pay their property taxes to support public education and vote for millage extensions. Stop the snide comments about public schools.
Meanwhile, even the most ardent public school advocates must realize that private schools have to be part of the mix if Little Rock is going to attract the kind of highly educated, talented workers needed in the knowledge-based economy of the 21st century. Many such workers will demand these schools for their children.
It isn't an either/or proposition. We must have good public and private schools.
Senior Editor Rex Nelson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. He's also the author of the Southern Fried blog at rexnelsonsouthernfried.com.