The Blair Oaks R-2 school district Tuesday night hosted the second of two meetings to gauge the local community's interest in proposals to fund the construction of a new high school, and while attendance wasn't quite what it was at the first meeting, the crowd had a unanimous approval of the district taking a more financially proactive path to a new high school.
When the 30 or so people present in Blair Oaks Elementary School's gym were asked which of two proposed options to finance a new high school they favored, every hand that went up was for option 1, which would have the district's Board of Education raise the district's debt service levy by 30 cents in two weeks.
The majority of attendees at the first meeting July 19 - also in Blair Oaks Elementary School's gym - showed support for increasing the district's debt service levy in August, with nearly 70 hands raised at that time.
Members of the Blair Oaks Board of Education have until their Aug. 14 board meeting to decide if the board should raise the district's debt service levy by 30 cents, from $0.91 to $1.21 - without voter approval at the ballot - or if board members want to wait until the April 2019 election to ask voters to increase the debt service levy by the same amount.
Raising the debt service levy earlier would mean saving money in interest payments - $52,000 if the levy is raised in August, compared to a savings of $16,000 in interest payments if the board waited until April 2019.
A higher debt service levy sooner would also allow the district to ask voters to approve a bond issue to construct a new high school with a bonding capacity that would be a couple of hundred thousand dollars larger.
Board member Greg Russell compared it to saving on a home mortgage by paying it off sooner and not having to pay that much more interest.
Either way, the new high school would be constructed in two phases, with the first phase costing an anticipated $14 million. The second phase would cost up to $4.75 million.
A new high school for grades 9-12 would be approximately 114,000 square feet and include a 600-seat auditorium and a 2,000-seat gym. The school would be located across the street to the east of the current Blair Oaks Middle School.
If the first phase of the new school opened in August 2021 and then the second phase was completed by August 2025, then the current elementary school would host grades K-2, the current Blair Oaks Middle School building would house grades 3-5, and the current Blair Oaks High School would become a grades 6-8 building - with room in all four buildings to grow.
Superintendent Jim Jones said at the previous community meeting that if the debt service levy was raised by a lower amount, that would limit the district and push phase two off to a later date.
Rising seniors Student Council President Brayden Langendoerfer and Treasurer Annette Peterson were in attendance Tuesday, and they favored the first option that gets Blair Oaks a new high school sooner.
Langendoerfer said even though because of his age he wouldn't ever be a student at a new high school, he wants the district to prosper because he wants his future children to attend Blair Oaks someday and have the resources students like him have wanted but haven't had.
"It'll be bigger and there will be more classes offered," Peterson said of her hopes and expectations for a new high school, though like Langendoerfer, she's not young enough to ever be a student at it.
Both students said they would have wanted more science classes in their high school academic careers, with more technology incorporated.