District still wants middle school upgrade
By Jeff Gallatin
North Olmsted
Published June 6, 2007

School officials are looking at different ways of addressing district capital improvement needs including renovating the current middle school or finding some way of upgrading it.

During the May 21 school board meeting, board members Chris Glassburn and JoAnn DiCarlo both advocated forming a subcommittee or having the board re-examine the need for capital improvements such as upgrading the middle school.

“There is still a need to address that issue,” DiCarlo said. “I would hope that we could find some way of dealing with the needs we have in the district.”

Superintendent Kurt Stanic said the district and city residents are going to have to deal with the issue.

“It’s like I’ve said before about both the operating and facility needs - the problems haven’t gone away,” Stanic said. “We’ve gotten the operating needs addressed after several attempts, but there is still a need to deal with facility problems, in particular the middle school. Anybody going through that facility would see that.”

After district officials implemented some service cuts and said that jobs, school extracurricular programs and other areas would be eliminated or slashed, voters approved a new operating levy in February after the four previous attempts since November 2005 failed. District officials also tried twice in the last two years to get capital improvements levies passed which would have included funds for converting Pine School into the district’s new middle school, converted the historic portions of the current middle school into a performing arts area and community center open for use to the entire city, upgraded school athletic, music and science lab facilities.

In November 2005, the district combined the capital improvements plan with an operating levy proposal but voters rejected it. After getting feedback that some voters had been confused by the merger of the two plans, the district separated them in May 2006, but voters rejected the capital plan by a 54 to 46 percent margin and the operating plan by a slightly less than two-to-one margin. After that, school board officials focused on getting the operating levy passed, with that proposal failing in August and November 2006 before being approved in February.

Stanic and school board officials said there are different ways to go about considering renovations for school facilities. Stanic said he thinks the district could still partner with the city on some renovations. During discussion of the city’s work on a recreation master plan, Stanic and Mayor Thomas O’Grady both said they had informal discussions about upgrading the high school football field as part of  that master plan.

“We shouldn’t overlook working with the city where we can,” Stanic said. “Different parts of the community like the schools and city all use the different facilities, so if we can devise ways to work together we should do it.”

Stanic also reiterated the district still has needs in the middle school and other areas, like the science labs and performing arts.

“We need to have some kind of resolution because the problems are only going to get worse until they’re addressed,” he said.

O’Grady, a former North Olmsted middle school teacher, said there is a definite need.

“As a former teacher there, I can tell it just doesn’t work for education that way,” O’Grady said. “It’s not conducive for teachers to work together, and we need to review as a community the needs of our students and the district for a new middle school.

“As for the athletic fields we are certainly open as an administration to working with the schools, but it has to make sense and be the right thing for all of us.”

DiCarlo said she would like to see the district talk to people with a high level of expertise. She said she heard experts like this at a national meeting of school board officials.

“There are specialists who deal in working with older buildings and specific types of structures,” she said. “I’d like us to take some time and talk with some people and companies who work on projects like that.”

DiCarlo said that because portions of the middle school are deemed historic and valuable, she’d like to see builders or contractors able to deal with that kind of structure review the structure.

“You can’t really replicate or duplicate some parts of it, so I’d like us to see what it would take to incorporate them into a good renovation of the building,” she said.

DiCarlo advocated having the classrooms redone to meet contemporary standards while still trying to retain the historic flavor.

“This is something which we can do over the summer while classes aren’t in session and they can review the building a little easier,” she said.

School Board Vice President John Lasko said the district needs to take a thorough look at the situation.

“We put a lot of time and effort into a five-year projection of  the district financial picture and needs and we should be the same kind of fixation and thought into a projection of capital needs,” Lasko said. “We need to study what is the best way to move ahead on this.”

Lasko said he has no problem working with the city or other entities on the issue.

“In this time of shrinking fiscal resources for communities, it only makes sense to find ways to work together on something which would benefit all of us,” Lasko said. “If we can find ways to get this done through other means, that’s fine. I just want us to put the right effort into it so we don’t have to go back and fix mistakes because we didn’t do our due diligence.”