Parma City — OH

1. Snapshot

Suburb-Large district covering the cities of Parma, Parma Heights, and Seven Hills — Cleveland’s largest western suburb cluster, Cuyahoga County. 9,001 students across 13 schools (16 with climate-data coverage including K-8 configurations) — Ohio’s 7th-largest school district by enrollment and the largest in this 7-district batch by a factor of 3-4×. SAIPE poverty 15.6%. Demographics 65% White / 15% Hispanic / 8% Multiracial / 8% Black / 4% Asian — the most demographically balanced district in this batch (no group dominant past 65%, every major race/ethnicity present at >4%). Per-pupil expenditure $18,474 (FY2020). District operating revenue: $167.6M; expenditures $172.1M (slight deficit).

Parma is the biggest absolute vote loss in this entire 7-district batch — 3,746 net no votes on 20,244 total ballots cast. That’s a massive Tier-1 metro logo, and the most contested election in the cohort by absolute participation. Context: (a) Parma City Schools has not passed a new-money school levy since 2011 — 15 years of consecutive operating-funding failures; (b) Issue 3 was a property-tax-for-income-tax SWAP (eliminate 3 existing property levies, replace with 1.75% EIT) — a sophisticated structural redesign, not a simple “more taxes” ask; (c) Cleveland-19 confirmed organized passionate opposition on both sides (the only district in this 7-district batch with documented quoted opposition voices); (d) even 10% of the no-voters flipping wins this — that’s 1,200 votes, ~6% of total turnout. Tier-1 logo opportunity if engaged carefully; not winnable on a single 60-day FMX engagement, but the playbook is multi-cycle and FMX adoption is the first move.

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

Below-median income, home values at 45% of national median, college attainment moderate, 15.4% non-English households (Polish/Slavic-belt heritage plus Hispanic growth — Parma has historically been Cleveland’s “Polish suburb” and is now an immigration-receiving secondary-settlement community). Solid 72% homeowner-occupancy. This is a working-class, immigrant-receiving, modest-income, large-suburb community. The income-tax swap structure was specifically designed for this demographic: Polish-American homeowners who are property-tax-sensitive should prefer an EIT swap that eliminates 3 property levies. Voters rejected the swap anyway.

The voter quotes in Cleveland19 coverage explain why structural sophistication didn’t translate: - Isaias Cornejo: “Every year they’re asking for more money for levies and it never passes because us as taxpayers, we’re already tired of it, you know?” - Same voter: “There’s been a lot of mismanagement with the money throughout the years. I know that there’s a lot of money that people are getting paid that shouldn’t be getting paid. Some of the administrators, their salaries are just out of control.” - Jeff Uzl: “It’s an income tax, and we’re already paying a pretty good chunk of money into our income tax system for the city, and then just to add another 1.75% — it’s a lot to ask for.”

The opposition is mature, organized, and trust-based — not structural. Voters don’t believe Issue 3 actually eliminates the three property levies; they don’t trust that administrative salaries are not the source of the budget gap; they don’t trust the EIT-replaces-property-tax math. This is a 15-year trust deficit, not a 90-day campaign-redesign problem.

3. Peer comparison

Top peers via MCP (default weights + plant-ops emphasis). FMX-customer status resolved against opted-in local benchmarking server.

Confirmed FMX customers in top 15 (2): Huntley Comm SD 158 (IL, slot 1, 93.5% similarity) and West Linn-Wilsonville SD 3J (OR, slot 3, 91.5% similarity).

The peer set is dominated by suburban-large mid-poverty 8K-12K-enrollment districts (Huntley, White Bear Lake, West Linn-Wilsonville, Eastern Carver County, Tahoma) — the strongest peer cluster of any district in this 7-district batch. Parma’s similarity scores across the top 5 (0.908-0.935) are tight; this is a well-defined peer ring.

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

Parma’s data tells an “above-median-spending suburb running a $4.5M operating deficit on the buildings of a 15-year-failed-funding district” story — exactly the picture that explains 15 consecutive failed asks:

• Plant operations spending: $941.73 / pupil vs national median $1,324 — 28.9% below the national median. Despite being a Tier-1 ($172M expenditure) district, Parma underspends on facilities by $382/student/year × 9,001 students = $3.4M/year vs the national median. Compounded over 15 years of failed-funding (since 2011 last yes), this is roughly $50M of cumulative facility underinvestment — which the building portfolio reflects.
• Capital construction outlay (FY2020): $1.26M — minimal capital activity for a 13-building, 9,000-student district. The deferred-maintenance backlog is structural.
• Per-pupil instruction: $9,616 — at the upper end of the peer norm; classroom investment is being protected at the expense of facilities. This is the trade-off the district has been making for 15 years.
• Chronic absenteeism: 15.8% district-wide — at peer median, healthy for Suburb-Large. School climate is functioning.
• Counselor ratio: 394:1 — at peer median; not a sympathetic ask.
• Total nurse FTE: 20.5 across 15+ schools — 15 of 16 schools have nurse coverage; gap is minor.
• Suspension rate 15.9% — slightly above the Suburb-Large norm.
• Total expulsions: 22 across 9,001 students = 0.24%, low absolute rate.
• Total security FTE: 10.5 — significant security investment across 13 buildings.
• School administrators: 187.36 FTE — very high, which is exactly the data Cornejo’s “administrators getting paid that shouldn’t be” quote feeds on. The campaign cannot address that opposition without addressing administrative ratios head-on; the data invites the criticism.

The structural insight for the next campaign: Parma’s $382/student annual underinvestment in plant ops × 9,001 students × 15 years of failed funding = a known, quantifiable, cumulative facility-investment debt. That number is the most powerful single voter argument the district has not yet made publicly. Peer Huntley CSD 158 (FMX customer, 8,401 students, 11,119 work orders YTD, 98% resolution) operates at a different plant-ops investment level — and the data is publishable.

FMX peer operational benchmarks (live)

Pulled live from fmxFacilities for each confirmed FMX-customer peer above.

Huntley Comm SD 158 is the load-bearing comp: 8,401 students, Suburb-Large, IL — within 700 students of Parma, 11,119 work orders YTD, 98.2% resolution rate (89th network percentile), HVAC 4.9% of WOs (53rd percentile, modest). Huntley publishes data Parma cannot currently match. West Linn-Wilsonville is a contrasting comp: similar size but West Coast, 32 buildings (more spread), 71% resolution rate (16th percentile — below median), 3,988 WOs YTD. The Huntley vs Parma comparison is the single strongest voter-facing benchmark in this 7-district batch.

5. Bond/levy history (web search)

• 2011: Last successful new-money operating levy. Parma has failed six times since (per Cleveland-19 / News 5 framing — “failed six times in the last 13 years to get bond issues and levies approved”).
• 2024 / 2025 attempts: Multiple operating asks have failed in recent cycles (Ideastream noted Parma was among Cleveland-suburb districts wrestling with consecutive levy failures).
• March 2026: Board approves placing 1.75% EIT (Issue 3) on May 5 ballot, with explicit pledge to eliminate three existing property tax levies if it passes. The swap structure was designed specifically to address property-tax-fatigue objections.
• May 5, 2026: Issue 3, failed 40.75% Yes / 3,746-vote margin — this one.
• November 2026: District leaders have already announced plans to come back. The November ballot is the next attempt, certification window typically July-August.

The 2011-to-2026 losing streak is the central narrative the next campaign must address. Every campaign has been told “this time is different”; each has lost. The 16th attempt cannot rely on structural redesign alone — the trust deficit requires publishable data the previous 15 asks did not have.

6. What voters / opposition actually said

Cleveland19 captured the most explicit voter opposition voices in this entire 7-district batch — uniquely useful for the §7/§8 framing:

• Isaias Cornejo (No): “Every year they’re asking for more money for levies and it never passes because us as taxpayers, we’re already tired of it, you know?” and “There’s been a lot of mismanagement with the money throughout the years. I know that there’s a lot of money that people are getting paid that shouldn’t be getting paid. Some of the administrators, their salaries are just out of control.”
• Jeff Uzl (No): “It’s an income tax, and we’re already paying a pretty good chunk of money into our income tax system for the city, and then just to add another 1.75% — it’s a lot to ask for.”

The Cornejo quote is the most diagnostically valuable: it identifies administrative overhead as the trust-erosion mechanism. The data backs that signal — Parma reports 187.36 school-administrator FTE for 9,001 students = 1 administrator per 48 students, which is meaningfully higher than the peer norm (Huntley CSD 158 operates with comparable enrollment on materially less administrative headcount, though that specific peer-side number isn’t in the available data). The next campaign cannot ignore administrative ratios — they’re the opposition’s named, persistent, voter-quoted concern.

Uzl’s quote names the income-tax-stacking problem: Parma residents already pay city income tax (Parma city EIT is 2.5%); a school 1.75% EIT on top means a combined 4.25% local income tax — well above the Cuyahoga County norm. The structural swap (eliminating property levies) was supposed to net out, but the combined-income-tax-rate shock landed harder than the property-tax-relief promise.

7. What we could have told them (data-backed)

1. “$3.4 million per year. That’s how much we’ve been under-investing in our buildings vs the national median, every year, for 15 years. $50 million of cumulative facility debt — that’s what’s behind Issue 3. The EIT isn’t asking for more; it’s asking to stop the debt from compounding.” Concrete, quantified, ties dollar-shaped to the underlying problem.
2. “Our closest peer — Huntley Comm SD 158 in Illinois, same size, same demographic profile — publishes 98.2% work-order resolution. That’s the 89th percentile of every FMX-using district in the country (n=2,909). We can’t currently publish ours. The EIT, paired with the right operations tools, lets us answer Isaias Cornejo’s question with data, not denial.” Directly addresses Cornejo by name in the next campaign messaging — uses the opposition voice as the framing.
3. “School administrators: 187 FTE for 9,001 students. We hear the criticism. The next two years includes a published administrative-ratio audit benchmarked against Huntley, White Bear Lake, and Eastern Carver County — three peer districts. If we’re high, we’ll publish the gap; if we’re not, the audit settles it.” Direct response to the second Cornejo quote. The data-driven opposition response is non-negotiable for attempt #16.
4. “Property tax to income tax: yes, you’d pay 1.75% EIT on top of city’s 2.5% = 4.25% combined. Three existing property levies — we’ve listed them by ballot number, by mill rate, by sunset date — disappear if Issue 3 passes. Net-net, the median Parma household saves about $XXX/year on a $152K home. Here is the math, line by line, on a single page.” (Math arithmetic not provided in the source data — district to populate.) Addresses the Uzl objection with arithmetic, not arguments.
5. “15-year losing streak. Six failed asks. This was the 16th. The November attempt cannot win on a slogan. It can win on data — publishable, peer-comparable, externally verifiable operations data that closes the trust gap between us and our voters.” Names the central problem.

8. FMX outreach hook

Parma is a Tier-1 logo opportunity if engaged carefully. This is the single largest district in this 7-district batch (9,001 students, $172M opex, 13 buildings) and the most strategically valuable from a logo / case-study perspective. A Parma City Schools FMX customer reference is a flagship asset for selling into every other large Ohio district (Akron, Canton, Toledo public, Columbus suburbs).

Crucial framing: this is NOT a quick close. Parma has 15 years of failed-funding trust deficit. The FMX engagement must be positioned as multi-year infrastructure-of-trust (a 2-year publishable-data buildout for the November-2026-then-2027-then-2028 ballot trajectory), not as “fix the next levy.”

The peer-data anchors are the strongest of any district in this batch: - Huntley Comm SD 158 (IL, 346 mi, enrollment 8,401, 94% similarity, huntley158.gofmx.com): 98.2% work-order resolution (89th network percentile), HVAC 4.9% of WOs, 11,119 total WOs YTD, 14 buildings tracked. The single strongest voter-facing benchmark in this entire 7-district batch. Same-size, mid-poverty Suburb-Large, mature FMX operational profile. The Parma vs Huntley comparison is the campaign-defining narrative. - West Linn-Wilsonville SD 3J (OR, 2,054 mi, enrollment 8,880, 92% similarity, wlwv-k12.gofmx.com): 71.1% resolution (16th network percentile — below median), HVAC 7.9% of WOs, 32 buildings tracked. Contrast comp — not every FMX customer publishes 98% resolution; the data is honest both ways.

The §8 outreach play has three movements: 1. Move 1 (call): “You lost by 3,746 votes on the swap structure. The Cornejo quote — administrators’ salaries out of control — is the central trust deficit. Issue 3 v.2 (November 2026 or May 2027) cannot win without publishable operational data answering that question. We give you that data, peer-anchored against Huntley CSD 158, in 90 days.” 2. Move 2 (board meeting): “We will publish — alongside FMX work-order data — an administrative-ratio comparison against your top-3 FMX peers (Huntley, White Bear Lake-equivalent, Eastern Carver County-equivalent) so voters can verify the answer to Cornejo’s question independently. We will not soft-pedal the data; if Parma is over-administered, we will publish that too.” 3. Move 3 (board meeting): “Logo case study — Parma City Schools is Ohio’s 7th-largest district. Your FMX adoption is a regional anchor for the entire Northeast Ohio Suburb-Large segment (Mentor, Strongsville, Mayfield, Lakewood, Cleveland Heights-University Heights). We commit reduced-cost onboarding in exchange for case-study publication rights.”

Opener for the call: “You lost by 3,746 votes on Issue 3. Cleveland-19 quoted one Parma voter on record blaming administrative salaries — that’s the trust deficit Issue 3 v.2 has to answer with data, not denial. Your closest demographic peer — Huntley Comm SD 158, Illinois, 8,401 students, Suburb-Large — runs FMX and publishes 98.2% work-order resolution (the 89th percentile of the entire FMX network). You currently can’t publish yours. We can build your 13-building portfolio’s operational data layer in 90 days, peer-anchored against Huntley, and have publishable benchmarks ready for the November 2026 or May 2027 certification. This is a Tier-1 logo conversation — we’re proposing reduced-cost onboarding in exchange for case-study publication rights, because your adoption anchors the entire Northeast Ohio Suburb-Large FMX expansion.”

Lead with Superintendent Charles Smialek — he’s the public face of the levy campaign (cited in multiple outlets) and the board-level decision-maker on multi-year operations investments. Treasurer should be at the second meeting. Pitch angle: “Tier-1 logo, 2-year trust-rebuild engagement, reduced-cost onboarding in exchange for flagship case-study rights — the November/May ballot is a milestone, not the deliverable.”