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Kenosha Unified seeks five‑year, $23 million referendum to close budget gap; district ties $3M in safety upgrades to measure
Summary
Kenosha Unified Superintendent Jeff Weiss told the Pleasant Prairie Village Board the district will ask voters on Feb. 18 to authorize a limited five‑year operational referendum to exceed the revenue limit by about $23 million to cover operations and safety‑upgrade debt service; trustees pressed the district on timing, turnout and long‑term funding.
Kenosha Unified Superintendent Jeff Weiss presented the district’s proposed operating referendum to the Village Board, saying the district will ask voters on Feb. 18 to authorize exceeding the revenue limit by about $23,000,000 for a limited five‑year term beginning with the 2026 school year and ending in 2030. He told the board the request combines operational support and borrowing to pay for safety upgrades that followed a November incident at Roosevelt Elementary.
“We now face a $19,000,000 deficit for the 2025‑26 school year and beyond due to a lack of funding support from the state,” Weiss said during the presentation. He described the measure as nonrecurring and emphasized it would expire in 2030 unless resubmitted to voters. Weiss urged that prior rightsizing — including seven school closures and eliminating roughly 200 full‑time equivalents — had already reduced costs but left the district short of resources.
District staff provided high‑level fiscal context: staff described a long‑term decline in enrollment from about 22,000–23,000 students at peak to roughly 18,500, which has reduced per‑pupil revenue and required boundary changes and other efficiency steps. The presentation reiterated that Wisconsin’s revenue‑limit formula has not kept pace with inflation since 2010, and that KUSD’s analysis shows an inflation‑adjusted gap on the order of the tens of millions.
Trustees pressed the district on the choice of the February primary rather than the spring election. Weiss said the February timeline aligns with staffing notification deadlines mandated by state statutes and that waiting until April would compress the district’s staffing and course‑selection processes. A trustee cautioned that the February primary typically has lower turnout and questioned whether Pleasant Prairie taxpayers — who contribute a disproportionate share of the local levy compared with their share of enrollment — should bear the burden.
Weiss framed the referendum as an urgent, short‑term step while district leaders continue to advocate for state‑level funding changes. “This is a Band‑Aid,” Weiss said, “but I don’t want to be coming to communities and begging for money through a referendum.” The district encouraged residents to use its online tax‑impact estimator to calculate specific household effects and announced additional town‑hall sessions across the district.
