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Lewiston Public Schools superintendent urges voters to back 29-cent mill rate increase in referendum
Summary
Superintendent Jake Langless asked residents to vote in a referendum that would fund a 2.15% budget increase for Lewiston Public Schools, a proposal officials say is driven largely by personnel costs, enrollment growth and building needs.
Jake Langless, superintendent of Lewiston Public Schools, urged residents to vote in a referendum tomorrow on a budget that includes a proposed 29-cent increase on the local mill rate and a 2.15% spending increase approved by the school committee and the city council.
The request matters because Lewiston school officials say 71% of district spending covers personnel and that personnel-related requests account for about 95% of the budget increase. "Seventy-one percent of our total budget is our people," Langless said, adding that officials scrutinized nonpersonnel spending line by line to limit the local ask.
School leaders told the town-hall audience the school committee approved a 2.15% increase and the city council subsequently approved the same percentage. Langless said the district is proposing a 29-cent increase on the local mill rate; he noted the city’s final…
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