Oak Harbor’s beleaguered boosters received a badly-needed kick in the spirits last week when voters overwhelmingly agreed to renew the school district’s four-year maintenance and operation levy.

The success came on the heels of three recent elections with starkly different results: Voters solidly shot down two high school rebuild proposals and one call for a new downtown library. So a win for the home improvement crowd was badly needed.

Last Tuesday’s 68 percent “yes” vote for the M&O levy provided a solid win, indeed. Support went well beyond the formidable 60 percent minimum required to pass the levy, which suggests that voters are pleased with how the money from the first levy four years ago was spent and want to see existing programs continued.

The levy money enriches the community through art and physical education instruction at the elementary school level and with a district-wide hot lunch program, plus advanced and remedial classes at the high school. Had the levy failed, the results would have been too dismal to contemplate.

Levy supporters did an outstanding job getting the message out and school supporters did an outstanding job of going to the polls or mailing in their ballots. If there was a downside to the election it was voter turnout. Only about 46 percent of registered voters in the district cast ballots. This suggests, perhaps, that there was no great impetus to vote against this proposal, but that a lot of voters stayed home because they are still not great enthusiasts of additional public spending.

If there’s a message to be drawn from recent elections it’s probably that Oak Harbor voters will support what’s necessary to retain proven programs, and to provide safe, decent facilities. But they’re unlikely to support anything deemed by critics to be fancy or superfluous. One reason this levy passed is that the school board resisted considerable pressure to put more costly bells an whistles on the proposal and just stuck to the basics.

Those contemplating future school or library proposals should take heed. Keep it simple and keep the price reasonable, and success could be yours.