Schools ask for $215M from voters

PALMER — School bonds seeking voter approval on the ballot in October will, as planned, total $215 million.

If passed, the Mat-Su Borough School District says the school bonds will take care of construction and major maintenance projects for five years. The bonds will build five schools, upgrade sports facilities and pay for large renovation projects.

The school district will only be able to sell the bonds if the state chips in. The state usually pays off 60 to 70 percent of school district bonds.

On Tuesday, the school district announced an alternative plan with a packaged whittled down to $128 million, focusing on two years of work, rather than five, but would have still built a new Jr./Sr. high somewhere along Knik-Goose Bay Road.

School board member Lynn Gattis said she supported the paired-down package, given how tough the economy is right now.

“Even though these are needs, we also have to look at our constituents,” she said. “Learning is one thing but eating is another.”

But at a Mat-Su Borough Assembly meeting that night, assembly members voted instead for the original five-year package, assemblyman Jim Colver said Wednesday morning.

The five schools envisioned in the package include the Jr./Sr. high school, a new elementary school also in the Knik-Goose Bay Road area, a replacement for Wasilla’s Iditarod Elementary and permanent facilities for Valley Pathways and Mat-Su Day School, both of which are operating out of less-than-ideal facilities.

“I don’t have any kids going to school, but this is a pretty darn good deal. The economic multiplier is the key to it. It’s going to produce a ton of jobs,” Assemblyman Vern Halter said at the meeting, according to a recording on the borough’s website. “I’m assuming we’re going to have a lot of local contractors. I’m assuming some of the property values will go up because they always do near schools. I’m assuming a lot of things are going to be positive.”

Colver said the package passed 5-2 and he was one of two members who voted against it, citing uncertainty in the economy as his main reason for casting a nay vote.

“Everyone agreed that the high school needed to get built. There was no disagreement on that,” Colver said. He said if the bonds pass, he won’t look kindly on school bond propositions over the coming years. “I’m going to hold it to it when they come back and want more in a year or two.”

A former school board member, Colver said he wasn’t convinced that all of the projects needed to go ahead on the timeline described in the bond package.

He said he also isn’t convinced the district needs to upgrade all of its high school sports facilities.

“Why do we need every single facility to have turf? Why aren’t we looking at a compound like a dome?” Colver asked. “Should we have a reasonable core area facility that they could use it four seasons?”

Contact Andrew Wellner at andrew.wellner@frontiersman.com or 352-2270.