Dixie School District levy defeat confirmed by single vote after hand recount
By Dan Thesman on Thursday, March 19th, 2026 in Columbia Basin News More Top Stories
WALLA WALLA COUNTY – A hand recount has confirmed that a capital levy for the Dixie School District failed by the narrowest of margins, matching the original election night results of a single-vote defeat.
The Walla Walla County Election Department has announced that the final tally remained 107 “yes” votes to 108 “no” votes, mirroring the initial count.
The high-stakes verification process required Walla Walla County election workers to manually re-sort more than 15,000 ballots cast in the recent election to isolate and verify the 215 votes specific to the rural school district.
The failed measure was intended to replace an expiring levy. Had it passed, the levy would have collected $75,000 annually to fund essential capital infrastructure and facility improvements.
Prior to the hand recount, Superintendent Jacob Bang said the district planned to rerun the levy in the November election.
