(KAIR)--Voters in USD 377 will go to the polls Tuesday to decide whether or not to give the school board authority to raise the district's capital outlay levy.

Superintendent Steve Wiseman says an increased mil levy would help pay back a recent federal loan recently granted to the district in the form of a $3 million QZAB bond that the district “has to pay back over seventeen years, $176,000, which the board has budgeted for, but the reality is, when the capital outlay...there has to be a mechanism for to how to pay for those types of expenses.”

Funds from the loan are being utilized to make several structural improvements to both the Elementary and Junior/Senior High Schools, and Wiseman says this method is different than what has happened in past years in that “in the past, what we have done is that we have shifted funds away from the classroom and from other funds in order to maintain our facilities, our buildings. It's a situation where when you take into consideration everything that has been on capital outlay, what we have done in the past is we have basically been using money from other areas to pay for that, rather than use the mechanisms designed by the state legislature, which is a capital outlay mil levy.”

Wiseman says there is a four mill levy in place currently, and the resolution, if approved, would give the school board the authority to raise it up to eight mills, the maximum allowed by state law.

Atchison County Clerk Pauline Lee is reminding voters that polls will be open from 7:00am-7:00pm, with advance voting at the clerk's office ending today at noon. Voting information, including a list of polling places, can be found on the county's website atchisoncountyks.org.