STANWOOD – Stanwood-Camano School District leaders will ask for three tax requests on the May 16 ballot.
The three proposals include $119.5 million worth of bonds for construction projects – including rebuilding Stanwood High School – plus a levy raising $5 million over six years for technology improvements.
In all, the proposals would tack on an estimated $1.32 per $1,000 of assessed value to the local tax rate, or $330 per year on a $250,000 house.
| On the ballot
The Stanwood-Camano School District will put three tax requests on the May 16 ballot. Proposal – Proposition 1: $110.7 millionEstimated cost per $1,000 assessed value – $1.03 * Rebuild Stanwood High School as a 264,800-square-foot building to house 1,800 students. * Add classrooms, lockers and an auxiliary gym at Port Susan Middle School, enlarge its library and cafeteria, and improve bus access. * Improve the heating and ventilation system, replace the west gym floor and add fire sprinklers at Stanwood Middle School. * Improve the heating and ventilation system, resurface play areas and add a clock and bell system at Stanwood Elementary School. * Improve the heating and ventilation system, replace the roof and carpets, resurface the play areas and improve traffic-flow and entry at Twin City Elementary School. Proposal – Proposition 2: $5 millionEstimated cost per $1,000 assessed value – 20 cents Six-year technology levy to update equipment, create an electronic student reporting program, provide more parent access to student information and other projects. Proposal – Proposition 3: $8.8 million Estimated cost per $1,000 assessed value – 9 cents Improve Stanwood High School stadium complex, including a new field house, locker rooms, home bleachers, all-weather track and football field surfaces, roof over visitor bleachers, press box, scoreboard, lighting and resurface tennis courts. |
The school board approved the ballot language on Tuesday.
“We’ve been laying the groundwork for all of this over the last five years,” Superintendent Jean Shumate said, noting that more than 1,500 people took part in recent meetings and surveys.
The package’s focal point is rebuilding Stanwood High School at its existing site, 7400 272nd St. NW. Newer areas, such as the gymnasium and performing arts center, would be saved.
The project’s $104 million price tag would be offset by $8 million in state funds, according to district estimates.
If approved, construction on the 264,800-square-foot building could start in summer 2008 and last two years. Work would be done in phases, as students and teachers move between old and new parts of the school.
The current high school, first built in 1971, has evolved over the years through a series of additions patched together into two main buildings. There also is a satellite campus for overflow, a former elementary school.
District leaders say the result is an overcrowded campus that is confusing to visitors, poorly laid out and inadequate for today’s technology needs.
The new school would be a single building with capacity for 1,800 students in four classroom wings, plus room for future additions. About 1,700 students currently attend the main campus.
The overflow campus would become the home of the alternative Lincoln Hill High School.
Besides Stanwood High School, the proposed bond also would make $14.7 million worth of improvements to the district’s two middle schools and Stanwood and Twin City elementary schools.
Work would include classroom additions, improved heating and ventilation systems, new play surfaces and other upgrades.
The district separated an $8.8 million proposal to improve the high school stadium from the other building requests into a second bond request.
A technology levy also was added, and includes improvements at the rebuilt high school, as well as other schools.
“We’re trying to keep them separate: three propositions for three pretty distinct things,” said Gary Platt, executive director of business and operations.
Bonds are for building projects and are sold in chunks, then repaid over a long period of time with approved tax dollars. Levies pay for a variety of things, including capital and day-to-day operations.
Both kinds of measures require a 60 percent supermajority to pass.
Reporter Melissa Slager: 425-339-3465 or mslager@heraldnet.com.
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