Building for the future

But, times have changed. These days it"s looking as though the school district will open three new elementary schools within a two-year period.

"We"re being true to what was said when we passed the sales tax initially, that the focus would be on replacing old schools," Superintendent Larry Williams said. "We allowed the middle schools to take precedence for a variety of reasons, but the plan was always to get to the elementary schools. That"s been part of our commitments since the get-go."

Back in 1998, when Woodbury County residents first were asked to approve a one-cent sales tax for school infrastructure, it was noted that Sioux City was home to the oldest operating elementary school in Iowa, the old Irving Elementary School at 1022 Jennings St.

County residents voted in support of the 10-year sales tax, so Sioux City used its portion of the money to build three new middle schools and also a new Irving Elementary School at Ninth Street and Floyd Boulevard. The old Irving closed its doors in the spring of 2006, after having served this community"s children for 120 years.

Opening Irving

Last year more than 200 students had to be bused out of the Irving area due to a lack of space at their neighborhood school, with many of them going to Riverside Elementary School.

But Riverside didn"t have a lot of space either, according to fifth-grade teacher Chris Erickson. He said he was in a portable classroom at Riverside last year, so his class had to go outdoors to go to lunch or special classes, such as music or physical education.

"We had weather last year where it was pouring and we were running as fast as we could like drowned rats," he said.

Riverside doesn"t have to use those portable classrooms this year because students from the Irving neighborhood came home to their new school, and some of their teachers n like Erickson n came with them.

Cathy Mrla came to the new school from the old Irving, and called the more modern facility a better environment for learning. For one thing, the third-grade teacher said there was no air conditioning at the old Irving, and at times this made it difficult for anyone to find the energy to concentrate.

"Before, when it was hot, they just wilted," she said. "It was difficult for teachers and students to continue."

Now these two teachers have been at the new Irving for a semester, and they said, as did Principal Rich McGrath, that one of their favorite things is their school"s media center. McGrath said it"s quite an improvement from what students had in the past.

The old Irving"s library was the same size as a regular classroom. Librarian Ann Hathaway said that because it was such a small space, she had to turn away some of the classes that wanted to be in there.

In contrast, the new Irving"s media center is big enough that a class could be there working on computers, another class could be there looking for books and yet another class could be there listening to a story n all this happening at the same time.

Hathaway estimated that these days, a third of Irving"s 600 students visit the media center on any given day, and every student gets down there at least once a week. McGrath said increased access to the library is a good thing.

"It"s the heart of a school," he said. "The school"s goal is to help promote literacy. What better place than to go to a library to do that."

Besides a larger media center and air conditioning, the new Irving provides handicapped accessibility, a larger gym, a lunch room that"s separate from the gym, a sink and drinking fountain in every classroom, and a bathroom in every kindergarten and first-grade classroom. There"s also more energy efficiency, more electrical outlets to accommodate the new technology and obviously less maintenance costs than with a 120-year-old building.

Starting two more

The new Irving was the last school the district could construct with revenues from the first 10 years of sales tax money. So citizens voted in August 2005 to continue the sales tax a second 10 years until 2018.

Two months later, school board members asked local experts whether it would be better to borrow money and start more building projects right away or to wait to begin any additional projects until the second 10 years of sales tax revenues started coming into the bank. Local experts advised the board to get started on new schools as soon as possible, for the inflation from waiting to build would most likely end up costing more than the interest on a loan.

So after Irving, the school board decided to build two more elementary schools as soon as possible, with both of them opening in the fall of 2008. There will be a new Leeds Elementary School, to be built west of Jefferson Street and south of 40th Street, and also Unity Elementary School, to be built on Logan Street between 18th and 20th streets.

The new Leeds school will serve some or all of the students who would otherwise attend the current Leeds, Hawthorne or Lowell elementary schools. The new Unity will draw some or all of the kids from McKinley, the old Grant, Hawthorne, Whittier and Leeds elementary schools.

FEH Associates Inc. designed the new Leeds School, and this building project was awarded in December 2006 to Brown Construction of North Sioux City for $12,659,500. District officials said this bid came in about $1 million lower than they were expecting.

Cannon Moss Brygger and Associates designed the new Unity. The lowest base bid for this construction project was $9,066,200, and district leaders said that was about $3 million less than expected.

Because the bids for these construction projects came in so low, Williams said there"s a chance the district will be able to build yet another two new elementary schools with the second 10 years of sales tax money.

Williams said that before, it seemed certain the district could only build one more school and then also do one major remodeling project. He said these favorable bids mean the district can at least consider the possibility of constructing two completely new elementary schools instead.

"The calculation of the board and the citizens who brought the second 10-year sales tax issue before the board on an accelerated basis has proven to be a wise move," Williams said. "When we get a bid that favorable, it"s hands down obvious that building sooner rather than waiting is going to save the taxpayer money."