North Ridgeville voters reject bond issue, income tax increase for new schools, rec center

NORTH RIDGEVILLE — Voters rejected a joint ask from North Ridgeville city and schools to build new schools and a recreation center, according to unofficial results. Issue 6, an 8.65-mill bond issue to fund a new high school, elementary school, performing arts center and transportation facility, lost by 1,179 votes, according to unofficial results Tuesday night. With all 24 precincts reporting, 6,991 residents, or about 46 percent, voted for the bond issue; 8,170 voted against the issue, or about 54 percent. Issue 28, a 0.2 percent income tax increase, also was defeated — by 3,215 votes, according to unofficial results. Only 39 percent of residents, or 5,901 voters, were in support of the income tax increase, while almost 61 percent, or 9,116 voters, were against the income tax increase. The joint venture would have built new schools and a community center connected to the new high school. Both issues needed to pass for the project to move forward. "Overall obviously we're disappointed, the community decided that this wasn't the right time for this," Mayor Kevin Corcoran said Tuesday evening. "The challenge that we have going forward is that the schools still need the space. I think obviously there was a lot of communication about that but maybe it wasn't effective enough." Corcoran and school officials had been optimistic early Tuesday but will now have to go back to the drawing board to get a bond issue passed in May to be able to retain a more than $32 million credit from the state in support of the project. The bond issue looked to raise $190 million over nearly 40 years to replace the school's buildings. That could go back to voters in the spring, as the need for space at the elementary and high school levels aren't going away, Superintendent Roxann Ramsey-Caserio said. "The need still remains and will only get more complicated as time goes on and we need to address it," Ramsey-Caserio said. "We'll find another way to approach our community but in the long run our kids deserve better, our community deserves better and we'll get there." At the end of the day, the schools and recreation center are separate issues, she said, and while it would be nice to do both, the schools are Ramsey-Caserio's grave concern. The superintendent and the mayor both said they plan to look at voter turnout numbers and other data to plan for the issues moving forward. The city last tried to pass an issue for a recreation center under Mayor Deanna Hill in the early 2000s and asked voters to support an outdoor aquatic center in 2018. Voters shot down both efforts, despite the decades between proposals. The school district asked for new money in November 2019 for the same work, which voters rejected as well. It again asked for an additional emergency levy in May, which voters also rejected. Owen MacMillan contributed to this report. Contact Carissa Woytach at (440) 329-7245 or cwoytach@chroniclet.com.