Leaders for the Hall County School System have some important decisions facing them in the next five to 10 years when it comes to building projects for the district.
At a work session Monday night, members of the Hall County School Board approved a five-year facility plan formulated by a visiting team organized by the State Department of Education. Team members for Hall County's review came from Forsyth, Rockdale, Morgan, Madison and Banks counties, according to District Superintendent Will Schofield.
"Every school district in the state of Georgia has to go through a five-year facility review," Schofield said. "[The team] reviews your numbers, reviews your facilities, reviews your plan and gives recommendations in terms of where you should go from here."
Schofield said the team offered 10 recommendations, but he felt there were three main "take-aways" from the report.
"One is that we've done an awful good job of being fiscally conservative and taking care of older facilities," Schofield said. "We have not knocked down a building in this district since before desegregation."
That said, there are elementary school buildings in Hall County that are now so old they need to be replaced.
"We are at a point of decision in terms of buildings that are 50, 60, 70, 80-years-old. It's probably time to start thinking about taking down some of those buildings and rebuilding them with new buildings," Schofield said, noting that consolidation of smaller schools is also a possibility.
Schofield said before the issue of aging elementary schools can be addressed, the district will need to build a new middle school for the Cherokee Bluff cluster.
"They, like us, see the need for a middle school in the Cherokee Bluff cluster sooner rather than later. We think that will happen in a three to five year window in terms of needing a middle school facility," said Schofield.
Schofield also pointed out that West Hall High School and Johnson High School each need a Performing Arts Center (PAC), similar to those constructed on other high school properties. There are other facility upgrades needed systemwide - plumbing, heating and air system, paving.
The price tag for all the work in the next decade could be as much as $250 million. Schofield said ESPLOST revenues would not be enough to cover the cost, and he noted the tax base is not growing sufficiently to provide funding for the proposed work.
"There's really only one way to do it and that's to sell long-term government obligation bonds," Schofield said. "We've been fortunate...we haven't had any long-term debit for the last four or five years...and we're probably coming to the end of that era."
Schofield noted voters would have to approve any financing through bonds.
