The mold that shuttered several portable classrooms in St. Francis is a symptom of larger problems in the Anoka County school district, say some parents and voters.

Those problems, they say, also may go a long way to explain why the voters in District 15 have voted four times against a plan to build a new elementary school, and may bode ill for the school board members up for re-election on Tuesday.

St. Francis Elementary School parent Leslie Flatum says she's angry with the district and with ModSpace, the company that owns the classrooms. It's finally clear, she said, why her 8-year-old daughter Natalie has suffered allergy flare-ups recently.

"At this point I'm not going to vote for any incumbents because I don't feel the situation itself was handled well," she said.

She said she learned of the mold problem on the 10 o'clock news, not from the school or the district.

Incumbent candidate Sandy Grams granted residents the right to vote their consciences, but added that the mold problem is not clear-cut.

"This issue is awful. It's terrible, and there is not a quick fix," she said. "I hate that our students are displaced, and our teachers are displaced and we're doing the best we can with the people that provided us with a product that isn't environmentally safe for humans to be in."

She also noted that the overcrowding that necessitated the portables could have been eased if voters had approved recent construction proposals.

Carrie Gulbranson, chairwoman of the St. Francis Elementary School parent-teacher organization, agreed.

"I really wish everyone would have voted 'Yes' for the school all along," she said. "They've been trying to get more permanent building space instead of the portables, and I really wish that would have been done instead. ... I will vote to give the money to the schools for the children, because they are the ones it hurts if it does not pass."

Still, others say those funding requests were denied because of voters' lack of trust in the board, compounded by a feeling they aren't being heard.

"The thing is, if we can't even provide portables that are safe for our kids, if we can't be responsible fiscally with that, people are like, 'Why should we entrust you with millions of dollars?'" said Fred Hanson, a candidate for one of the four school board seats. "The portables would just be what really magnifies the larger problem in the community; there's a lot of confusion, a lot of distrust that the needs and the issues haven't been worked through fully, so they're reluctant to throw good money after bad."

There's no elementary school levy on the ballot Tuesday, but residents will vote on renewing an existing referendum, and on a parent-generated proposal for a new, $65 million high school.

"I'm torn, to be quite honest," Cedar Creek parent Marsha Van Denburgh, whose first-grade daughter was not displaced by mold problems there, but who also said she'd be voting for a new school board. "We need some more space, but I'm not sure if a high school is the best option right now."

Maria Elena Baca • 612-673-4409

Maria Elena Baca • mbaca@startribune.com