On April 28th 2026, the renewal of the EP&O Levy, which supports the sports and arts in schools, passed in the Pasco School District, with 58% support, after it had failed on February 10th 2026.
You’ve probably heard people talk about some “levy” these last couple of months, but what even is the levy, and what will it mean, now that it has passed?
The Educational Program & Operations (EP&O) Levy is a levy that has been active in the Pasco School District for over 26 years, but failed for the first time February 10th of 2026 by only 59 votes, and a 50.27% against it during a special election. Because of the giant impact this levy has on our school system, the school board decided to schedule a follow up re-election for April of 2026, which would replace the ongoing levy that expires December 2026, but due to the previous failure, this raised a concern among a lot of students and staff members.
The levy was never a new tax, but simply a renewal of the already existing levy that supports approximately 13% of the school district’s budget, and is gathered through property taxes.
Even though public schools heavily rely on the state for funding, Washington state does actually not fund all of our programs in school. While they cover everything that is considered “basic education”, things such as sports, music programs, arts, clubs, theatre, or really anything but the required school subjects are funded by the local community through levies. So basically, all the things we students are passionate about in school, are being funded through the levy. Additionally, the levy also funds parts of the salaries of all teachers that teach visual arts, coaches of sport teams, school nurses and school counselors.
“I believe we would’ve been $50 million short,” said our principal, Verónica Machado, referring to what would’ve happened if the levy didn’t pass. “Which would’ve been a lot of money, that we weren’t accounting to not have, as a school district.”
Ms. Machado explained how it’s a goal in the Pasco School District to have a school nurse assigned to every school, but the state dollars alone aren’t enough to make that possible.
“So that’s where we use our levy dollars, to make sure that we’re covering the school nurses in the Pasco School District,” she said.
The state only covers the “basic education” of public schools, everything else is funded through levy dollars and local taxes. For example, the state does fund the Physical Education programs students are required to do during the school day, but they do not fund any of the after-school athletic programs, like football, soccer, or basketball.
So what would’ve happened if the levy didn’t pass?
“If the levy didn’t pass, it would impact our visual performing arts programs, coaching positions for athletics would be compromised, the counseling positions we have would be impacted, and so would our school nurse,” Ms. Machado states. “I’m sure transportation would be impacted as well, if we didn’t have those levy dollars, we would most likely have less bus routes to transport kids.”
The district would lose around $50 million of funding per year, which means they would have to cut a bunch of the programs we know and love from school, and additionally they would also have to make reductions to staffing and daily operations across the district.
So after the levy failed in February, the school district made sure to promote the levy for the renewal in April.
Even though levies tend not to get as much attention as other elections, this levy proves how important community involvement is to maintain our school programs. From after-school activities to mental support, the levy funds the things we as students rely on every day.
Now that it has passed, the school district will continue to be able to fund and support the activities that we value the most.
