School board faces growing population, limited space.
By: Scott Morgan
CHESTERFIELD In a near verbatim replay of December 2003, the district’s plans to build a new 60,000-square-foot elementary school fell short when voters turned down its $19 million construction and renovation plan Tuesday.
School officials had hoped the new school, plus facility upgrades at the existing elementary school, would provide the space needed for the growing student population, which they expect to triple within 10 years.
The referendum’s fate was sealed by fewer than 700 people (of a possible 1,878 voters), who voted 432-272 against the plan. Two years ago, 462 voters denied the district’s almost identical referendum, while 200 voted in favor if it.
The plan called for a new elementary school to be built in the western end of the township that would house the district’s growing population and renovations to parts of the current school on Bordentown-Chesterfield Road. While the school’s capacity is set at 271, the school population this year has passed 300 and is expected by district officials to reach 380 by the end of the June 2007 school year. Officials also estimate the population of the school could inflate to near 600 due largely to 1,190 new houses that are set to be built by 2010.
Had the referendum passed Tuesday, the new school would have been built to open in September 2008.
Where this year’s plan differed from that of 2003 is in the price tag. Two years ago, the project would have cost $17.5 million, but the state School Construction Corp. would have given Chesterfield a $3.6 million grant to offset the cost. While the district would have received the same grant amount this year, the project cost leapt to $19 million due to the general increase in construction costs over the past two years.
The owner of a house assessed at the township average, $212,000, would have paid an additional $450 under the proposed plan. The projected impact of the 2003 plan had been $290 for that homeowner.
With the defeat of the referendum Tuesday, Chesterfield very likely will be given no money toward the project in the future. Should the district have to go for another referendum (and Superintendent Constance Bauer said Wednesday that it will) Chesterfield’s taxpayers will most likely have to pay for the entire project themselves because the state fund for school construction is running out of money.
A disappointed Dr. Bauer said Wednesday that the school board now must evaluate all its options and all its feedback from both failed referendums. She said the board faces "a difficult series of decisions" in how it must cope with growing population and limited space. Classes, she said, will be moved to spare rooms and be taught a la carte or moved to trailers, more of which may soon be needed.
As for why the district’s pitch failed to connect with voters, Dr. Bauer said members of the public with whom the school board met in a series of meetings and public gatherings, often told school officials that they saw no need for two schools. Residents said they were worried about property taxes and that they did not believe the district’s population projections.
Dr. Bauer said residents also expressed a sense that the school’s bills should be shared among the future residents of those 1,190 new houses, since those people’s children would be the reason for needing a new school.
She said the flaw in the last line of reasoning is that the school’s population will inflate to critical levels long before all those coming residents settle in.
For the immediate future, Dr. Bauer said the school board will be taking a long look at what it has and where it needs to go.
"We have to look at every option," she said.