Ashtabula Area City Schools — OH

1. Snapshot

Town-Distant district on Lake Erie in Ashtabula County, NE corner of Ohio. 2,635 students across 7 buildings + a virtual academy — Lakeside HS (9-12), Lakeside JH (7-8), two intermediate schools (3-6), three primary schools (K-2, K-1, PK), Great Lakes Online Academy. SAIPE poverty 28.7% — the highest poverty in this 7-district set by a wide margin. Demographics 53% White / 22% Hispanic / 17% Multiracial / 7% Black — the most diverse district in the May 2026 OH re-run cohort. Per-pupil expenditure $16,829 (FY2020), buoyed by state aid into a high-poverty district.

2. Why this was a hard sell — community context (ACS)

This is a low-income, low-college-attainment Lake Erie former industrial town — median HHI under $46K, home values under $113K. The renewal cost is $26/year per $100K of home value, which on Ashtabula’s $112K median home = ~$29/year per household. Failing a $29/year renewal on textbooks and tech is not a tax-capacity story — it is a trust story.

The May 5, 2026 statewide cycle was hostile to schools across the board (42 of 66 issues failed, 64% rejection rate). The signal Ashtabula sends is sharper because it’s a renewal of money voters already approved. Voters voted against the status quo on a $29/household ask. That is reputational, not financial.

3. The gap story (what the data would have shown voters)

Ashtabula’s data tells a climate crisis story, not a facilities one — and the campaign couldn’t lean on the buildings argument because plant ops are actually high.

• Plant operations spending: $1,802 / pupil vs national median $1,324 — 36% ABOVE national median, one of only two districts in this 7-set above the median. This is not a deferred-maintenance district. Voters can argue (and probably did) “you’re already spending a lot to keep the buildings running.”
• Per-pupil instruction: $8,378 — middle of the peer band ($8,000-$9,500). Reasonable classroom investment.
• Chronic absenteeism: 58.3% district-wide. This is the headline. Lakeside JH 68.6%, Lakeside HS 62.3%, Erie Intermediate 54.4%, Superior Intermediate 49.9%, Ontario Primary 51.6%, Michigan Primary 37.1%, Huron Primary 112.8% (data anomaly — likely CRDC count > enrollment due to mid-year mobility in a high-poverty preschool). Roughly two-thirds of the student body is chronically absent.
• Suspension: 11.8% district-wide but Lakeside JH 21.6% and Erie Intermediate 16.8%. Lakeside HS 9.5%.
• 0 expulsions district-wide — paired with the chronic absenteeism numbers, this signals attendance is the disciplinary lever, not formal expulsion.
• Counselor ratio 403:1 — middle of peer band, but only 2.0 counselor FTE district-wide for 2,635 students. The high schools have counselors named; the K-6 buildings effectively share two people.
• Nurse coverage: 7 of 8 buildings have one — Huron Primary is the one without. 7.0 total nurse FTE — good coverage, again undercutting “the buildings are starving.”

The story Ashtabula’s data tells is that voters were asked to renew $500K/year for textbooks in a district where two-thirds of students are chronically absent, the middle school has 22% suspensions, and instruction spending isn’t the visibly failing variable. The ask was misaligned with the problem.

FMX peer operational benchmarks (live)

Three named FMX-customer peers at ≥90% similarity, all Town-Distant locales with comparable enrollment. Sparta WI is publishing the full operational stack at 740K sqft and 97.2% resolution — that is the benchmark Ashtabula’s next operating ask should be measured against. Newton KS at 96% resolution across 21 buildings has the cleanest portfolio-age (17 yr) data point in the cluster.

4. Bond/levy history

• Prior: Ashtabula has run this 1.25-mill renewal previously (it’s a renewal, by definition) — the existing levy was on the books.
• May 5, 2026: 1.25-mill 5-year renewal defeated 43.1% Yes / margin −497 votes.
• District has indicated a re-run is likely — the funds support core textbook/technology spending; the district will face the lapsed-collection problem in early 2027.
• AACS board has separately passed resolutions opposing state property-tax reform bills (per Yahoo coverage) — there’s political-economy context: voters and the board are both feeling squeezed by the Ohio legislature’s property-tax conversation.

5. What voters / opposition said

Coverage was thin. Fox8’s NE Ohio levy slate listed AACS without endorsement framing. Ideastream’s May 6 wrap-up lumped Ashtabula into the “majority of NE Ohio income tax levies failed” — though Ashtabula’s was a property tax renewal, not an income tax, which makes its failure more striking. The signal: voters rejected a 24-month-old approval at $29/household. That’s not opposition organizing; that’s institutional trust erosion. The AACS board’s own resolution opposing the state property-tax bill suggests the district’s voters are absorbing the legislature’s “your property taxes are too high” framing — even when the local ask is genuinely small.

6. What we could have told them

1. “68.6% of Lakeside Junior High students are chronically absent. 62.3% at the high school. We are not asking voters to pay for tech upgrades — we’re asking them to fund the textbooks and devices students need when they show up, in the buildings where 2-in-3 currently don’t.” Names the actual emergency.
2. “This is a renewal. The $29/year on your $112K home didn’t change. You already approved this. We’re asking you to not vote against yourselves.” The renewal framing has to be in the headline of every mailer.
3. “Plant operations: $1,802/student — 36% above the national median. We are not under-investing in buildings. The bond would not have been justified. This levy is for textbooks and Chromebooks — the things students hold.” Disarms the “schools are wasteful” argument by conceding plant ops aren’t the gap.
4. “Sparta Area Schools in Wisconsin — same Town-Distant locale, similar enrollment, 12 buildings — runs 97.2% work-order resolution at $0.009/sqft and publishes that monthly. Ohio’s HB1 conversation aside, our operational efficiency stacks up. The next ask is a transparency ask, not a trust us ask.” Names the FMX-customer peer specifically.
5. “$500K/year is 1.0% of our $46M revenue. The state’s property-tax reform conversation is real, but it’s not the reason your textbook line item disappears in 2027 if this isn’t renewed.” Counters the legislative-context noise.

7. FMX outreach hook

Ashtabula is 3 named FMX-customer peers in the top 15 — strong outreach footprint. The pitch shape: chronic absenteeism + reputational trust deficit + renewal failure = operational transparency layer is the only credible path to the next ask. The buildings argument doesn’t lead here; the we publish what we spend argument does.

• Sparta Area SD (WI, 525 mi, enrollment 2,749, 93% similarity, spartan.gofmx.com): 12 buildings, 740,441 sqft, 47.7-yr portfolio age, 97.2% resolution, $0.009/sqft, 3.26 WO/Ksf.
• Newton (USD 373) (KS, 912 mi, enrollment 2,965, 91% similarity, usd373.gofmx.com): 21 buildings, 17-yr portfolio age, 96.0% resolution, 9.6% HVAC burden.
• Sweet Home SD 55 (OR, 2,098 mi, enrollment 2,249, 90% similarity, sweethomek12.gofmx.com): 12 buildings, 506,977 sqft, 94.2% resolution.

Opener for the call: “You just lost a $29-per-household renewal by 497 votes — that’s not a tax-capacity problem, that’s a trust problem. The next ask has to be defended with operational transparency that voters can verify. Sparta Area Schools in Wisconsin runs your same Town-Distant, ~2,700-student profile and publishes 97.2% work-order resolution and $0.009/sqft inside FMX every month. Newton Kansas runs 21 buildings at 96% resolution. Both are at 91%+ similarity to your district. We can have your portfolio benchmarked against them inside 60 days — in time to make the next renewal cycle a published-data ask, not a trust ask.”

Lead with Superintendent + Treasurer/CFO (names not in OSBA data — source via aacs.net). Operations head if listed. The chronic-absenteeism crisis is a separate conversation from the FMX pitch, but it’s the political backdrop the FMX team should know going in.