FORT MADISON, Iowa — The Fort Madison School District this spring will, for a fourth time since 2016, ask voters to approve the issuance of a multimillion-dollar general obligation bond to build a new elementary building to replace its two existing ones.
The school board will decide on the amount of the bond Monday during its regular board meeting, though it will be about the same as what was proposed in April. The previous proposal, which was narrowly rejected in April when 59.24% of voters cast ballots in favor of it, was for a $30 million bond to be used to construct a new preschool-through-third-grade elementary building capable of serving 700 students, as well as two activity fields on property the district owns next to the middle school.
Based on input gathered Monday during a community feedback forum, as well as through an online survey, however, this bond likely will not include the relocation of the ball fields from the high school to the 95 acres of land the district owns at Bluff Road and 48th Street, which is now occupied only by the middle school.
"The board has processed that input and feedback in order to generate the question that will go on the April 2 bond referendum," Superintendent Erin Slater said. "Once that piece is done, we'll start to get into some more details about the actual project."
More than 100 people attended that meeting. Of them, more than 75 percent agreed the main area of concern is the elementary building.
The reason the ball fields were included in the proposal was to allow for future expansion of Career and Technical Education programming at the high school, which is landlocked by the fields. While some spoke in favor of the fields, others did not feel they are necessary at this time.
"We don't have enough information regarding what future costs of the new CTE proposals are," Alex Beck said at the meeting on behalf of herself and others who were in her discussion group. "We have usable fields at the high school and this is not a cost we feel should be included."
Eliminating the fields from the proposal would cut an estimated $1.02 million off the total price tag. The inclusion of additional site circulation, such as stop lights and additional turn lanes onto adjacent roads, however, is estimated to cost between $1.2 to $1.8 million. More than 75 percent of those who provided feedback were in favor of pursuing this option as it would improve traffic flow and safety around the middle school.
The district has made several efforts to bring the proposal in line with what its residents will approve. In addition to the community input meeting, the district gathered input from community members following the narrow rejection of the previous bond. As a result, it hired Carl A. Nelson & Co. to consult on the project, as well as CMBA Architects. The district had worked with BLDD Architects in preparation for the previous referendum.
"They felt that hiring a construction management company and a new architect company would bring a fresh perspective to the project," Slater said.
The construction of the proposed elementary building would bring preschool and elementary-aged children under one roof next to the middle school.
There now are two elementary buildings: Lincoln Elementary School is 83 years old, and Richardson is 101 years old. Neither elementary building has the space to accommodate preschool, which now is hosted in two separate locations not owned by the district.
It also would allow students and teachers access to more technology, collaboration spaces, safety features and accessibility.
While the bond will be about the same as what was rejected last year, the property tax impact likely will be less as the county's property valuations have increased by close to 23 percent this year.
The property tax impact of the previous proposal for a $75,000 home would have been about $36 per year for 20 years.
Slater was encouraged by the community meeting's high turnout.
"We're just thrilled at the number of people that came to the community meeting to give input to the school board. I think that's a very positive start to addressing the needs" of students, Slater said.
