Long-range school district facilities plan wins approval

The Red Wing School District may ask residents to vote on a new operating referendum as early as this November. The board also may ask for approval of an operating bond at that time.

With that looming deadline, the board unanimously approved a long-range facilities plan Tuesday night to help them determine what needs to be done and at what cost.

“If we’re running a referendum, we want to make sure we’re looking at long-term needs,” Finance Director Brad Johnson said.

The district faces a lot of large facility updates, including things like a new roof for the high school, a new parking lot and technology updates districtwide.

In addition, the recent closings of two parochial schools have bumped up the district’s elementary enrollment, making space a concern.

“That’s left us fairly tight,” Johnson said. “Do we need to look at space if we’re going to go out to the public?”

The plan approved Tuesday night has set out six phases to help the district determine exactly what its facility needs are. It was drafted by the D.L.R. Group, an architecture, planning and engineering firm out of Minneapolis.

“D.L.R. can provide a third-party objective look at demographics, all our facilities, use, technology,” Board chairman Mitch Boldt said.

The six-phase plan covers a 10-month period and includes assessing and evaluating all the district’s facilities based on educational goals, studying current and predicting future demographics, looking at options and solutions to needs, refining the plan and finally communicating the district’s needs to the community.

“This is an information-structured approach to it,” Boldt said.

The plan comes at a cost of $10,000 to the district, which will not be paid until actual architecture and engineering services are required and due only if the bond goes through.

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