Avon Lake Schools announce revamped facility plan, with a lower price tag

At the Avon Lake State of the Schools event on Wednesday, Superintendent Joelle Magyar outlined an updated plan for the district's future facilities and finances. A large portion of both Magyar's speech and the questions from the public that followed focused on the district's failed $170 million construction bond issue to build three new school buildings, which failed in November by 400 votes. On Wednesday, Magyar revealed that the district hoped to decide on a new ballot measure in May, this one combining the cost of the construction bond with an operating levy and permanent improvements bond, to be placed on the ballot in November. Magyar said it was too early to provide an exact amount, but that with cost-cutting measures to the new facility plan, the total combined issue would cost less than the original $170 million ask, which had only included a construction bond and provided for no operations money. Shortly after the failure of the previous issue, which sought to raise funds for two new elementary schools and one new middle school, the Board of Education voted to put the issue back on the ballot. That decision was later reversed after the Board and Magyar were sued by a parent for holding the vote from Columbus while attending a conference among other open meeting law violations. That lawsuit has since been settled. Magyar said the district decided its next step should be hearing from the public, and began with conducting a survey of all city residents. She said the questions were formulated carefully to follow the rules of the Ohio Ethics Commission, but the district was still able to gain important information from over 1,200 residents. "From that, we learned a couple messages loud and clear," she said. Those messages, Magyar said, were that the community wanted the district to stick to its plan of three schools, that residents were wondering if the $170 million price tag was strictly necessary and that they did not want the district to request a construction bond then place an operating levy on the ballot in short order. One of the first steps the district took in responding to the survey was to hire a new architect to review its facilities plan. The plan would build new elementary schools at the sites of Eastview Elementary and Troy Intermediate School and a new middle school on the property of Learwood Middle School. Avon Lake Schools officials have maintained that constructing new schools is more cost-effective than making necessary renovations to the district's existing buildings. Those renovations would themselves cost more than $103 million and would take years to implement. The basic framework has been kept the same but the district hired a new architecture firm, ThenDesign Architecture of Willoughby, to review what could change to lower costs. "We've been working with the same architect on this project for three and a half years," Magyar said. "Sometimes when you're doing something for so long you get that thing called tunnel-vision … So we thought, let's get a fresh set of eyes on this project, maybe there's ways to make the project not as expensive." Magyar said ThenDesign altered the plan to build pre-kindergarten facilities only at the new Troy facility, rather than at both elementary schools as originally planned. Additionally, the new design substantially reduced the combined square footage of the three combined projects, and scaled back other aspects like the renovation of Avon Lake High School. All of this, Magyar said, would reduce the overall cost of construction to a maximum of $155 million, a reduction of nearly 10 percent. The other major change to the project was the idea of a combined ballot issue, featuring an operations levy and a permanent improvements levy. If combined with the construction issue, Magyar said, the operations levy would cost about $7 million per year. If the combined bond were to fail, she said that the district would not attempt another construction levy but that subsequent operating levies would be much more expensive. "We don't want to have to come back and put something on the ballot in two years," Magyar said. "So the idea is, one ask. We have one ask of you, and it's going to cover all of the needs the district has; building issues, operating issues and our permanent improvement needs." Magyar explained the thinking behind placing an operating levy on the ballot in the near future, saying that the district is spending in a deficit of about $2 million a year. At that rate, the district is expected to fully expend its cash balance by 2028. Magyar said that the district expects to have a cash balance of just over $10 million by the end of the current fiscal year. "Our monthly bills are $4 million a month," she said "So when you look at a cash balance of $10 million, that's just over two-and-a-half months of expenses in our cash reserve. If anything happened and we had a catastrophic anything, that money is gone." She said that the state recommends districts have at least two months' worth of expenses in cash reserve at any given time and that the district would fall below that amount by the end of next school year. She said if the proposed combined issue fails, the district would have to put a new operations levy on the ballot quickly. "We wouldn't have a choice," she said. "The last thing we want for our district is to go into state takeover, where the state says 'we are going to tell you how to spend your money.'" School districts can fall under state control if they fail to stay financially solvent. Magyar said that residents will have another chance to make their voices heard. ThenDesign Architecture and Avon Lake Schools officials will hold a public forum on May 8 at Avon Lake High School to gain resident feedback on the updated plan. Contact Owen MacMillan at (440) 329-7123 or omacmillan@chroniclet.com.