While growing areas of Minnesota confront those challenges from a place of economic abundance, Traverse County and places like it operate in scarcity that threatens to spiral.
For Traverse County schools and government entities that receive funds based on population, the effects of population decline were compounded by the high inflation of 2022 and 2023.
On Tuesday, voters in two of the county’s three school districts will face referendums on special tax levies. The districts need to cover fixed costs after state aid fell with enrollment decline.
“When you have a small district like us, where there are one or two elementary teachers per grade level, you can’t make adjustments easily to reduce teachers,” said Daniel Posthumus, superintendent and elementary principal of Wheaton Area Schools. Last school year, it had 383 “adjusted pupil units,” a measure in the state allocation formula, down from 396 the year before and 450 a decade ago.
The Traverse County courthouse in Wheaton, Minn., is the subject of local debate over whether it should be renovated or replaced with a new one. (Evan Ramstad)
About 90% of Traverse County’s property tax base is agricultural, and for years the Board of Commissioners strove not to raise taxes. Over the years, thrift degraded into parsimony. The current board had to boost levies significantly after inflation hit.
“They went multiple years of zero levy increase or 1%,” Metz said. “We have a courthouse that’s falling apart. We have a jail that is struggling. Years ago, a 1 percent or 2 percent raise would have made us so much better off right now. Unfortunately, my first two years in, we’ve had some of our highest levies.”
