The Washoe County School District is looking for funding approval on its first round of projects since a county sales tax increase to help with school overcrowding and repairs.
The first project that needs funding approval is an expansion to Damonte Ranch High School. If the $23-million budget is approved, two additions would be built onto each end of the building, adding 22 new classrooms.Â
"That would have likely been our first high school to have to go to double session," says Joe Gabica. "So this is really an important project that we get done."
If approved by the Capital Funding Protection Committee, the district could break ground as early as January 2017 and open the additions to students by the end of the year, if not earlier.Â
"On a day to day basis [the students] are not going to see too much change at this point in time," says Kristen McNeill, Washoe County School District Deputy Superintendent, "We'll work very closely with the school communities as far as any types of changes that they would see."
The district is also looking for funding approval to expand its nutritional services building.Â
"We were really fearful that we'd have to go to double sessions there," says Pete Etchart, Chief Operations Officer for WCSD, "to provide enough food for all of our students in lunches and breakfasts."
Other funding items up for approval are for designing new elementary and middle schools, buying land for two of the first three new schools and a budget for current school maintenance.
This first round of projects are not being funded with the sales tax increase but knowing the new revenue is coming allows the district to move forward.
Designing a school, for example, takes hiring engineers and architects which would be a waste of money if WC-1 had not passed.Â
The school district has an idea of where the first three new schools will go. The first is an elementary school in the South Meadows area. The land there is already owned by the district and the school could open to students as early as 2018.Â
Etchart says acquiring land is possibly the district's highest priority. It will work with public and private entities to get land for a middle school at the north end of Sun Valley and in the Kiley Ranch area of Spanish Springs.Â
"First of all I just want to say thank you to the community," says Etchart, "Obviously the commitment they've made to education is really exciting for us and we understand kind of the challenge we have now to get these schools built fast."
"It's a balancing act," says Gabica, "We want to move as fast as we possibly can. But not to the point where we're being wasteful or inefficient."
Every proposed capital project must go to the Capital Funding Protection Committee for approval. After that it goes to the School Board for approval. If the Board makes any changes, the plan then goes back to the CFPC for further approval, then back and forth until both agree on a plan.Â
The proposals go to the CFPC at a meeting Thursday, December 15th at 4 p.m. The committee can approval all or none of the recommendations or make changes.
If the plan is approved Thursday at the CFPC meeting, it will go to the board in a special meeting Tuesday, December 20th at 9 a.m.
District officials admit there may be an issue finding workers once construction begins because of a shortage of workers in the area. We will have more on this Thursday night on Channel 2.Â
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