What is a Referendum?

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Voters decide if the Levy is approved, how this happens:

• Politicians are limited in how much they can increase the levy without voter approval.
• So politicians levy the maximum non-voter approved levy is imposed.
• Then the politicians consider how much more they can convince the voters to vote for, and propose a referendum to fund this.
• The politicians then spend taxpayer money to influence the voters in hopes the voters will approve the referendum. (often it is sending out mailings, hiring public relations staff, and other costs and highlighting positive news about the schools in hopes the voters don't notice it is their taxes paying to increase taxes.)
• If a majority of the voters approve the referendum, the levy goes into effect, if not, the levy does not go into effect.

• VOTE, it is your money, make sure it is used well.
• PAY ATTENTION, politicians will spend your tax money to cast a positive light on the referendum, even though often this is throwing more money at a problem that the politicians can't solve with money.
• TALK to others, tell them what a referendum is, point out how much waste is occurring and if politicians waste money, why would we expect them to be responsible with more money?