The Kilgore school was built in 1929 and has served as the elementary school since Cody and Kilgore consolidated in 1965. The School Board has been working for many years to find a solution to address the urgent facility needs at the elementary building in Kilgore. These needs include many fire, safety, and handicap accessibility issues as well and electrical, plumbing, and sewer infrastructure issues. Our students deserve a safe and enriching learning environment. Our parents and staff deserve the comfort of knowing their children are in a safe space. Repairing the current facility is not a viable option, as the costs would amount to a significant portion of what it would take to build a new school.

In short: efficiencies! For the past 60 years the elementary has been in Kilgore and the high school has been in Cody - 15 miles apart. There are obvious advantages to having all the students and staff on the same campus.

• Significant operational costs savings

• Eliminates the time and cost for shared staff to travel between schools (The schools are currently sharing P.E., Art, and Music teachers, as well as a Superintendent.)

• Efficient use of support staff between grade levels

• Collaboration between grade levels improves transitions and learning

The current high school facilities, built in 1980, are also in need of vital renovations and more space, which would be more cost effective to include in this building project.

We attempted to pass a $6.5 million bond measure in 2021 and it failed to pass. The reasons it failed are complex, but important. The short answer is that the majority of the tax burden will fall on a small number of landowners.

First, there are very few taxpayers in the district. The population of our school district is one of the smallest in the state. This is not just due to the sparse population density but also the fact that the boundary of our school district encompasses an area MUCH smaller than the area served by our school system. In fact, nearly 50% of the students educated at the CK School have been “non-resident”, meaning these families’ taxes actually fund a different school district! This has meant our school has always struggled with funding.

Secondly, a large portion of the land in our school district is actually part of the McKelvie National Forest, so has no tax revenue.

Meanwhile, local landowners are already saddled with a disproportionate tax burden. Most large landowners are ranchers and though their land is valued very high, that hardly translates to money in their pockets. Ranching is a way of life and many have to scratch and scramble to make it work. Raising the tax burden significantly could put some ranchers in the position of possibly having to sell their land to pay the taxes on it.

There is one additional tricky problem we’ve faced since the beginning of this effort:

It is hard to secure private donations before a bond has been passed. Yet, it is hard to ask folks to vote for a bond without knowing the level of private contributions there will be.

THIS is the problem that Cowboy GRIT solves. We can serve as the non-profit vehicle for donations AND offer Subscription Contracts that tie donations to the passage of bond. Now we can secure donation commitments before a bond has been passed and circumvent this chicken/egg problem. Before the first bond vote in 2020, a small committee gathered over $1 million in pledges. Now those pledges and more can be secured with Subscription Contracts to give voters confidence as we look to a second bond vote.

It has been “back to the drawing board” to try to find another way. The school board called every resident of the school district to try to determine what size bond would be passable. The consensus has settled around the $3 million mark.

The original building plan cost was over three times this amount, so the architects were asked to provide various cost-saving plans for consideration. We now have many possible building plans, with estimated costs starting at $4.3 million. So at a bare minimum we need to raise the difference of $1.3 million through “non-traditional” means. The school board has indicated they hope to put bond to a second vote in 2024. However, ideally, we need to meet our fundraising goal before the vote.

The Cody-Kilgore district will be forced to consolidate with a neighboring district. Most likely this would be Valentine, 38 miles east of Cody. Many students would have an hour or more of travel to and from school. The newly consolidated school district may still need to increase taxes, due to the significant influx of additional students to the Valentine campus. The repercussions on the Cody-Kilgore community are a matter of speculation, but there is general consensus that the villages of our district would be tremendously impacted. And in fact we have seen this play out in many rural communities throughout the region. The economic and social impacts on a community due to the loss of a school cannot be overstated.

The Cody-Kilgore school district serves a vast geographic area (much of which actually isn’t even technically in our district). Students come from a 553 square mile area - spanning two time zones, two states, and three area codes. Just two bus routes travel a combined 312 miles every day to bring kids to and from school. The rural agricultural lifestyle is integrated into the school - students are excused to help at brandings and many have chores to do on the ranch before and after the long drive to school. Students travel hundreds of miles to compete against other small schools in sports and other activities. Cody-Kilgore has one of the last 6-player football teams - they won the state championship in 2021 and ESPN even did a feature. Cody-Kilgore students manage and staff the Circle-C Market, giving them incredible real-world experience, while providing the community with a vital resource. In short, CK students are engaged and invested in their community and, in turn, the school is the heart of our community.