Voters casting ballots at the Clearview Elementary School in Clear Lake Tuesday followed the district-wide trend in rejecting the one-question referendum brought forward by the St. Cloud School District.  The tally from Clearview showed a total of 259 district residents voting in favor of the measure and 544 voting against it.

 

An article in the St. Cloud Times Wednesday stated that election judges at Clearview began the day in the mistaken belief that photo identification was required to vote in the election, which violates current Minnesota election law.  The article went on to state that three voters were affected by this error, and that two had been able to return and cast ballots after the confusion was rectified by district officials, according to school district spokesperson Tami DeLand. 

 

District-wide results posted on the Secretary of State’s website Thursday morning showed 7,652 district voters in favor of the referendum and 9,004 opposed.  The referendum was approved in the Oak Hill, SCSU, St. Johns and Westwood precincts.

 

The ballot question asked voters to approve a $167,000,000 building bond that would have included construction of a new Technical High School ($113,800,000); a renovation of Apollo High School ($46,500,000), enhanced security for all schools ($2,500,000) and technology infrastructure updates ($4,200,000).

 

St. Cloud Supt, Dr. Willie Jett was quoted in published reports as saying that the district would have to “go back to the drawing board”, and that the voters “brought passion to the polls and that’s a good thing no matter the result.”