By Cheryl Schweizer
Chronicle correspondent

     PATEROS - Voters will be asked Feb. 9 to decide on a two-year maintenance and operations levy.
     School district officials are asking for $455,000 for collection in 2011 and $475,000 for collection in 2012.
     If the levy is approved, district property owners would pay about $2.45 per $1,000 of assessed property value in the first year and $2.54 in the second year. For the owner of property valued at $100,000, the tax would be $245 in 2011 and $254 in 2012.
     Ballots are being mailed this week. The measure needs a simple majority to pass.
     Superintendent Lois Davies said the levy and state levy equalization funds would make up about 11 percent of the district's budget. Levy equalization funds are provided to districts with lower property values, although the program is among those targeted for state cuts.
     If voters approve the proposal, the money would pay for some of the programs supported by the current levy - part of the cost for the district's music and art programs, instructional time in other programs, technology upgrades, textbooks and materials, and maintenance and repair of district facilities.
     All of the district's extracurricular program, including sports and clubs such as the FFA and Knowledge Bowl, must be paid for locally, Davies said.
     The proposed levy also includes some money to buy school buses. District officials included funds in 2006 and 2008 to buy buses, since the district's fleet no longer qualified for state compensation on the transportation depreciation schedule.
     Davies said the district is catching up, but it's not where it needs to be on that depreciation schedule yet.
     Plans for levy money are contingent on receiving levy equalization funds.
"We don't know if it will get (levy equalization) or not," Davies said.
     If the program survives, it could take cuts, and "even half of (the cuts) they're threatening is still incredibly significant," Davies said.
     District voters passed a $1.3 million construction bond issue in 2009; some of the projects have been completed, while others are still in the works, she said.
     The Pateros School Board has approved tentative contracts for heating system/air conditioning upgrades, kitchen and bathroom remodeling, and security system and fire alarm upgrades. District officials are looking at options for upgrading the bus garage, including moving it.