Officials in two Brazos Valley school districts have begun planning projects approved by voters this month, while another district is regrouping after residents narrowly rejected a $10 million bond issue for a new school.

Voters in the Anderson-Shiro and Leon school districts passed bond packages totaling $41 million for new buildings and renovations in the May 10 election.

In Iola, a school administrator said he hoped to draft a new proposal that voters would be more willing to approve in the next election.

Anderson-Shiro

Proponents of Anderson-Shiro's $23 million bond measure fought hard to convince residents of the need for a new high school and renovations to an existing school.

Their efforts paid off when 339 people -- 55 percent -- supported the bond issue, while 275 people voted against it.

School district officials brought the same proposal before voters in November. It failed that time by 22 votes.

School Superintendent Fred Brent said he thought the first election was a wake-up call for parents.

"I think parents of the kids realized if they didn't stand up and get actively involved, their kids wouldn't get a new school," he said.

There are about 620 students in Anderson-Shiro schools.

Dana Wagner, an elementary school teacher and member of Citizens in Support of Quality Schools, said seeing the measure fail last year by so few votes motivated her to try to reverse the outcome.

"When it failed, I received at least 10 calls the next day" from supporters who wanted to know what had happened, she said.

Wagner said she thought part of the reason it failed the first time was because Tenaska, an Omaha-based natural gas company with an office in Shiro, opposed the bonds.

A Tenaska spokesman confirmed Friday that the company had contacted voters by phone and advertised in the local newspaper against the bond issue.

Bob Dunson said the company opposed the measure because it thought the plans were grander and more expensive than the district's needs and because school officials did not seek sufficient input from community members.

"Our approach was to educate the supporters," he said. "It was just factual information to say to the public: Here is what is being proposed, and here is what is, perhaps, a bigger picture of what is being proposed."

Dunson said Tenaska officials understand that the district needs new schools.

"The one thing we don't like to do is oppose a bond issue. It's like saying you don't like apple pie: You just don't do it," he said. "It just looked like more than the community could afford."

The company makes up about 34 percent of the area's tax base.

In the end, Wagner said, the company's efforts inspired hostility from residents who felt an out-of-town company should not influence local schools.

"I think Tenaska kind of did us a favor, actually," she said.

The bond issue will result in a 38-cent tax increase, Brent said.

Current property taxes are set at $1.10 per $100 assessed property valuation, meaning the owner of a home valued at $100,000 pays about $1,100 in taxes .

About $21.7 million of the $23 million will go to building a 100,000-square-foot combined middle and high school and farm on 212 acres donated to the district in 1999.

The remaining funds will be used to renovate a facility currently housing fifth- through 12th-grade students. That building will be converted into an elementary school. The current elementary school, which was built in 1971, will be vacated.

The new school will have separate wings for middle and high school students -- something Brent said officials have wanted for a long time.

Wagner, who graduated from high school at Anderson-Shiro, said the elementary school was in bad shape and recalled an instance when she shut the door to her room and a light fixture fell from the ceiling.

"Basically, the school was kind of falling in around us," she said.

Brent said that it would take about 18 months to build the new school and that construction could start next spring.

"[The bond issue] will literally change the future of this district," Brent said.

Leon

In the Leon school district, an $18 million bond proposal passed with 341 votes -- 56 percent; 272 people voted against the measure.

School officials there haven't issued bonds since a $3.5 million package was approved by voters in 1990.

Superintendent Jay Winn said the bonds would pay for additions and renovations that would fulfill the district's needs for the next 35 years.

"This tells me that the majority of people are satisfied with what's going on at Leon [schools] and are very much in support of the district," he said. "It shows people have the children's best interest at heart."

Leon school board trustees were divided on the issue, with five voting to call the bond election and two voting against it in March.

Leon schools, which serve about 700 students, have some of the lowest taxes in the state, Winn said, with rates currently set at 89 cents per $100 assessed property value.

Officials predict that the bond issue add about 13 cents to that amount.

The money will be used to build an $18 million, 90,000- to 100,000-square-foot high school. Middle school students will occupy the current high school, which was built in 1982.

A few middle school buildings built between 1958 and 1960 will be torn down, and r facilities built in the 1990s will be converted to elementary classrooms.

Winn said he expected construction to be finished by fall 2010.

Iola

The Iola district's $10 million bond proposal failed by just 12 votes, 166 to 178.

As soon as the school bond issue was rejected by voters, Iola School Superintendent Doug Devine said, staff members began preparing a survey to ask residents what they would like to see on a similar proposition the district plans to place on the November ballot.

"I don't know for sure why [it failed]," he said. "We're going to try to find out with that survey."

The proposed bond issue would have resulted in a 44-cent tax increase per $100 property valuation.

Devine said that money would have built an $8 million elementary school and a new football field and renovated existing buildings.

He said the district, which has about 500 students, has been growing slowly over the past few years, but the elementary school, which has buildings constructed in 1952 and 1992, is bursting at the seams.

Officials planned to use vacated elementary school buildings to expand the middle school and create extra classroom space.

"We were disappointed, obviously," Devine said. "But the board will review the survey, and we'll probably come back again in November."

• Janet Phelps' e-mail address is janet.phelps@theeagle.com.

Comments

(Requires free registration.)

0 comment(s) found!