Thursday, November 29, 2012
Hopkins property owners would see school taxes grow by about 1.5 percent, while Edina school tax bills would drop by about 2 percent.
A proposal to carve off a piece of Edina from the Hopkins school district would cost Hopkins more than $550,000 in lost revenue, increase property taxes for those who remain in the district and jack up taxes for those whose properties change districts, according to a report released Thursday. Click on the PDFs to the right of this article to read the full report. The district requested the report in order to determine the financial ramifications of a request from Parkwood Knolls and Walnut Drive property owners who want to leave the Hopkins school district because they think its schools are not in locations that serve the families’ educational needs. The district has never had a school in Edina in its 130 years. Even though districts are …
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
Edina property owners who want to leave the Hopkins school district say detachment would only have a modest impact on the district.
Edina property owners who want to leave the Hopkins school district say Hopkins is better off than the district they want to join and that their departure would have minimal impact on Hopkins’ finances. Unite Edina 273 representatives made the arguments during a Wednesday morning meeting with Hopkins’ Citizens Financial Advisory Committee (CFAC) in which committee members also questioned the group’s motivations and how it’s funded. Unite Edina is made up of Parkwood Knolls and Walnut Drive property owners who say they want to leave the Hopkins school district because its schools are not in locations that serve the families’ educational needs. They say their request is about neighborhood schools and sense of community—not money. “When …
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
State law doesn’t specify a clear process for districts reviewing boundary realignment petitions.
On Sept. 28, residents dropped off a binder of petitions at the Hopkins school superintendent’s office from Edina property owners who want to leave the Hopkins school district. Because of vague state laws, it’s not clear what force of law—if any—those petitions have. “In the statute itself, there’s a lack of a process,” said Superintendent John Schultz. That lack of process has compelled Hopkins Public Schools leaders to devise a way for moving forward on a controversial school district realignment even as the specter of what the district will do looms over it and homeowners. Rumors have circulated about a set percentage of residents who must sign petitions in order for the issue to advance. But Schultz said he isn’t aware of any …
Friday, May 4, 2012
About 400 families in the Parkwood Knolls neighborhood want to leave Hopkins Public Schools for the Edina school district.
Edina residents who live in within Hopkins Public Schools boundaries have begun making the case directly to local school boards about why their neighborhood should be transferred to the Edina school district. At Thursday’s Hopkins School Board meeting, spokesmen from Unite Edina 273—which represents 400 families in the Parkwood Knolls neighborhood—asked the district to start working toward “a mutually agreeable solution” that would allow the neighborhood to change districts. The group plans to address the Edina School Board May 21. “School district boundaries should be about education, families and community, and not merely the possession of property taxes,” Unite Edina 273 Chairman Alan Koehler. The group asked the board to: Parkwood …
Johnson
5:02 pm on Friday, November 30, 2012
"A lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is putting on its shoes." ~Mark Twain more ›