While out and about promoting the Northshore School District’s supplemental levy, Mike Sharadin said he anticipated that voters would have complaints based on the still-recovering state of the economy.

Head of the citizen’s group pushing for the levy, Sharadin said he has been “pleasantly surprised” by the support the issue seems to be generating.

“The measure is far from extravagant,” he insisted, stating for the first of several times that the supplemental dollars would “backfill” cuts incurred by the local district due to reductions in state funding.

Sharadin did say he and others have spotted yard signs urging “no” votes on the levy, but he insisted those signs have been few and far between.

The signs likely were produced by resident Robert Terry, who has mounted a campaign against the levy issue, even taking out an anti-levy advertisement in the Bothell-Kenmore Reporter.

Terry has blasted the district for what he characterizes as over spending, saying the schools must figure out the difference between “needs” and “wants.” He has further noted local voters approved two money issues for the schools — two operating levies and one capital improvement bond sale — in November 2009.

As example of what he called “wants,” Terry pointed to the improvements now under way at Pop Keeney Field in Bothell. He also talked about a “performing arts center” being added on to Woodinville High.

Addressing Terry’s comments on the work in Woodinville, Sharadin claimed that work has no bearing on the current issue before voters. He said the question will provide operating funds, not capital improvement dollars such as those being used at Woodinville High.

According to Sharadin, the work there consists of updating classrooms, partly allowing for greater use of technology such as classroom computers. He said the plans do include a music and arts stage, but he does not think that project is comparable to the Northshore Performing Arts Center built a number of years ago on the Bothell High grounds.

Terry also blasted what he argued is a pricey teacher mentoring program and the purchase of the district’s administration building in Bothell.

In discussing the levy issue, school officials have said they are anticipating a $2.9 million budget gap for the 2010-2011 school year. As the district board of directors already had to approve a budget for next year, they closed that projected gap with approximately $3 million in budget adjustments. The biggest dollar move consisted of dipping into the district’s savings for $2.2 million, a step Superintendent Larry Francois repeatedly has claimed is a one-time, stop-gap measure.

Local leaders repeatedly have slammed Olympia for what they say are repeated funding reductions. But the supplemental levy would take advantage of changes to state law made by those same legislators.

By law, local tax collections can comprise no more than roughly 24 percent of any school district’s overall budget. When Olympia cuts funding, the dollars districts can take in from local collections drop, as well, according to Francois and others. Presumably in response to that situation, state legislators adopted new rules allowing certain local collections to remain at a certain level even as total school budgets shrink.

At the same time, lawmakers authorized school districts to go to the polls, asking voters to approve increases in the percentage of revenue dollars that can be collected locally.

For Northshore, supplemental levy passage would increase the amount of local funding to 28.9 percent of the district’s total budget. The actual amount collected would depend on the system’s total budget, but estimates have ranged from $5.3 million to $12 million.

If the highest collection levels were reached, initial district figures set the cost of the levy to property owners at 20 cents per $1,000 in valuation. Officials since have stated collections would drop to 10 cents or 11 cents per $1,000 of assessed valuation for the last three years of the levy.

Again according to information released by the district, the total school tax rate with the supplemental levy in place would be $4.24 per $1,000 in property value in 2011, with the figure dipping to about $4.15 in the following years.

For a home valued at $400,000, the schools predict an average annual increase of $56 per year in property taxes over the life of the levy.