With only three weeks before the ballots are mailed for the Oak Harbor School District levy election, campaigners have intensified efforts to spread brochures, mailers and signs across town.

Supporters are even tapping into the “net effect.”

“We are embarking on new technology,” Superintendent Rick Shulte announced at Monday’s school board meeting. “We have a Facebook group.”

On this social networking Web site, the group “Vote ‘yes’ for Oak Harbor school levy” has 23 backers, many of them students. Volunteers have also uploaded campaign videos to YouTube.com.

But school board member Peter Hunt said overall visibility is still lagging.

“It will take at least a week and a half to get the publicity we need,” Hunt said. “However, it’s clear the campaign is growing momentum.”

Voters will find two proposals on the ballot for this March.

The first levy for 74 cents will continue existing programs, and the second 24 cent levy will boost the math program district-wide. Levy one must pass for levy two to take effect.

Today, the levy is set at 51 cents per thousand of assessed value. School officials say a tax increase is needed to renew the “intent” of the original levy. Over the years, the effect of the levy has deteriorated due to personnel costs and shrinking state match, Schulte said.

If both sections are approved for 98 cents, the district will qualify for the maximum state match for its first time. An extra 800,000 would be given, compared to the $400,000 received today.

In 2005, the levy passed by a healthy 68 percent, and at 64 percent in 2001.

This year, securing enough votes is made easier after Washington voters’ decided to dump a school levy law that was used since the Great Depression. In November 2007, a measure allowed school levies to be passed by a 50 percent simple majority of voters, instead of a 60 percent supermajority.

Supporters had complained that the supermajority requirement allowed a minority of voters to block money for schools. In the eight years before the measure was passed, 170 school operating levies in Washington won more than 50 percent of the vote, but failed to reach the supermajority required to pass, according to the Washington Association of School Administrators.

However, Oak Harbor resident Bill Burnett, who previously ran for the Oak Harbor School Board, also challenges the new requirement.

In 2001 and 2005, the district proposed and passed a 75 cent levy. This year, he says, the combined amount is too high.

“I think the simple majority has definitely affected the amount they’re asking for,” Burnett said. “A smaller percent is needed to approve the levy and I think if it wasn’t in place, the number would be more conservative.”

He added that levy one alone would collect $13.3 million over its four year span and the previous levy will have collected $7.8 million when it expires — a 70 percent increase.

“A true replacement levy is a tax rate with a base that’s constant and money collected would rise four or five percent a year with property values,” Burnett said.

School board members say the overall levy figure should drop by about 10 cents in 2010, from a decrease in the high school bond rate.

At Monday’s school board meeting, board members took comments on the levy, including those from student advocates.

Oak Harbor High School student and multi-sport athlete Josh Higbee voiced concerns about losing elementary physical education programs if the levy isn’t passed.

“Sports are a big part of my life and something I did in elementary school,” Higbee said. “I think without it, kids would become more lazy.”

Along with physical education, the levy supports lunch programs, 20 teachers, 12 support staff, two computer technicians and a number of Advanced Placement courses.

Principals Joyce Swanson and Dorothy Day continued with a presentation to the board about the levy-supported P.E. and art courses, with testimonials from teachers and students.

Before the levy, both programs were taught by regular teachers.

“Our elementary art and P.E. teachers now have advanced degrees,” Swanson said, adding that regular teachers also have more class time.

Secondary school math coach Dick Sander described his five years in Oak Harbor, teaching teachers new methods.

Levy two would support support more coaches like Sander, along with nine new math teachers, math assistants and newer technology.

In Oak Harbor, and across the state, the math portion of the Washington Assessment of Student Learning (WASL), generally produces the weakest scores. The state has also created new requirements for graduation, asking for three math credits instead of two.

“The new standards for math in Washington were kicked up a notch, so now it’s about seeing what the students can handle,” Sanders said.

For weeks, the school board has gathered information on the levy from teacher input and from first-hand experience. They’ve sat in on school lunch time, P.E. and art classes. And in order to come up with the levy amount, they sent out school and community surveys.

The school levy renewal vote is March 10, and mail-in ballots must be postmarked by this date.