A Sarpy tax levy challenge?

A vote scheduled for today may reveal the Sarpy County Board’s leanings on a potential constitutional challenge of the Douglas-Sarpy learning community.

The board will consider adopting a resolution to seek legal advice on the county’s options.

The resolution would ask Sarpy County Attorney Lee Polikov to investigate the state law that created the learning community “on its face and as applied” and report “what actions if any may be taken.”

Board member Pat Thomas of Papillion put the resolution on the agenda after the Legislature adjourned May 29 without addressing Sarpy County’s concerns about the common property tax levy in the two-county education cooperative.

“The Legislature’s now adjourned,” Thomas said. “They didn’t correct the situation. I said, well, it’s time for us to act.”

State lawmakers have shown little interest in revisiting the law’s core provisions. The Education Committee this year killed a bill offered by State Sen. Tim Gay of Papillion to repeal the common property tax levy.

Sarpy County officials say the levy would hit Sarpy taxpayers harder because their property undergoes a more rigorous valuation process than in Douglas County.

The Nebraska Constitution requires that taxes “shall be levied by valuation uniformly and proportionately.”

Board member Tom Richards of Bellevue warned Monday that a lawsuit would “open a can of worms” because other political subdivisions, including Millard Public Schools and the Papio-Missouri River Natural Resources District, straddle the Douglas-Sarpy line.

“If you’re going to sue over the learning community, you bring in a whole gamut of other entities that are impacted by that tax structure,” he said.

Richards said it’s a “false assumption” to think that a successful lawsuit challenging the financing would result in the end of the learning community.

By Sept. 1, the council that governs the learning community must set three property tax levies, including a common general fund levy for the 11 member school districts.

Elizabeth Eynon-Kokrda, an attorney for the Omaha Public Schools, said OPS officials think the learning community is constitutional “and it’s critical that it remain in place.”

In March, former Nebraska Attorney General Don Stenberg told Sarpy County Board members they would win if they sued challenging the constitutionality of the common property tax levies.

Rick Kolowski, chairman of the learning community council, doesn’t see Sarpy County’s tax concerns as an attack on the cooperative’s education mission to serve metro Omaha’s disadvantaged youth.

“It’s a legitimate question about valuations and who’s up to date with them and who’s doing them effectively and efficiently,” Kolowski said.

Contact the writer:

444-1077, joe.dejka@owh.com