EVERETT — The Everett School Board plans this week to tackle two hot topics — a new $23.3 million administration building and new tracks at Cascade and Jackson high schools.
People in the community questioned how the school district could afford to build a new administration building while
there are other needs.
A letter-writing campaign was started to lobby for improvements to the decades-old cinder tracks at the two high schools.
Superintendent Gary Cohn came up with a proposal to spend $2 million to replace the tracks with synthetic surfaces while still going forward
with a plan for constructing the 62,000-square-foot administration building at the south end of Everett Memorial Stadium on Broadway Avenue near 41st Street.
The money would come from state matching funds for construction.
Added into all of this is a new twist: The school district is now calling the administration building a “community resource center.”
The name change occurred to more accurately represent what was planned for the building, said Ed Petersen, school board president.
“It can be much more than just an administration building — and will be,” Petersen said. “So it’s a poor representation to call it that.”
Board member Jessica Olson, who has been opposed to the project, says the name change “seems contrived” as a way to sell the issue to the public.
The board is scheduled to meet at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday at the school district offices at 4730 Colby Ave. A public hearing is scheduled on both topics.
The school board’s small meeting room often leaves people standing in the aisles and spilling into the hallway. With a long list of other items on the agenda, it could take several hours for the two proposals to come up for public discussion.
The board is expected to take final action on the tracks and the administration building at its July 5 meeting.
Construction of new administration buildings nearly always draws public scrutiny. However, the timing of the proposal for the new building could add to the controversy. Cuts in state funding are forcing the school district to reduce spending by $4 million in the upcoming school year.
The financial fallout is expected to increase school lunch prices, change bus routes for high school students and could force increases in class size.
Yet school officials say a strong case can be made for the proposal. School administrators now operate out of offices in three buildings including the century-old Longfellow Building at 3715 Oakes Ave. That building is an energy hog, and it has not received safety upgrades to protect it in an earthquake or to prevent the spread of a fire.
A second building, the current educational services center at 4730 Colby Ave, is where Cohn and some of the district’s other administrators work. The site’s original building was constructed in 1964. Portables were added to the site beginning in the early 1990s.
The district’s special education offices at View Ridge Elementary School have recently been moved to the Educational Services Center .
Petersen said there’s the possibility of establishing an early learning program at the proposed new building to train staff who work with preschool children.
Although talks on such a program are still preliminary, the school district is interested in working with groups such as the Volunteers of America, United Way of Snohomish County and Head Start, “all working to create a whole new model for early learning,” he said.
“We’re talking about 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds and how do we … help all those children be ready for that first day of kindergarten, knowing 40 percent of kids entering kindergarten are behind on day one.”
“Our intent is for this to be a community educational center and encourage community involvement to the extent it benefits the education of our youth,” Petersen said.
Olson said the board has not discussed the potential uses of the building other than some general comments at an April 26 work session.
“They’re setting up conditions to make it appear this is absolutely necessary,” she said.
Dennis Finlayson, an Everett man who said he has worked on school construction projects for 40 years as a mechanical engineer, plans to attend Tuesday’s meeting to speak out against the proposed administration building.
“There are other options,” he said.
Among his objections to the new administration building is that state matching funds for construction projects would be used.
“Matching money is taxpayer money, this isn’t free money to spend,” Finlayson said. “It’s coming out of my pocket one way or another.”
The second issue at Tuesday’s meeting, improvements to the Cascade and Jackson tracks, triggered a letter-writing campaign to lobby for improvements.
In April, parents and a sprinkling of students turned out to a school board meeting to urge action to improve the tracks.
Cohn later followed up with booster groups from both high schools.
The $2 million proposed for both projects would pay for laying down a synthetic surface on the tracks and doing an analysis of other possible improvements, Cohn said. The resurfacing projects could be completed by fall 2012, he said.
Cohn said the track and administration building projects were bundled together in the same resolution because “we’re going to use state finance assistance dollars, so we’re taking care of them both at once.”
The board could decide to approve both or vote one or the other down, he said.
Sharon Salyer: 425-339-3486; salyer@heraldnet.com.
How to pay?
The Everett School District plans to pay for its new $23.3 million administration building with about $9.8 million in state funds and $13.5 million in future revenue and money saved since the 1980s. Here’s a breakdown of the school district’s share of funds:
Property sales: $3.4 million
Rent income: $ 1.3 million
Interest: $5.7 million
Rebates and grants: $200,000
Between now and 2013 when the building, if approved, is projected to open, the school district estimates another $2.9 million in revenue from rent, interest, property sales, grants and rebates, for a total of $13.5 million in local money.
Source: Everett School District
If you go
The Everett School Board plans to discuss a $23.3 million administration building and new tracks for Cascade and Jackson high schools at a meeting at 4:30 p.m. Tuesday, 4730 Colby Ave., Everett.
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