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Weathersfield to try bond issue again
By Mary Smith
MINERAL RIDGE
With the Nov. 8 bond issue failing by just 16 votes, the Weathersfield Board of Education voted to go back to voters a second time.
The district wants to get local funds to match a potential $15.6 million Ohio School Facilities Commission grant.
Earlier this week, the board approved placing a total of 7.6 mills on the March ballot, including a 6.6-mill, 30-year bond issue to generate $9,056,940 and a 1-mill continuous improvement levy to generate $85,521 for maintenance. The measure appears on the ballot as one issue, for a total of 7.6 mills.
“This is a necessity for our students,” schools Superintendent Damon Dohar said. “I think this is the best move we can make.”
Dohar noted that the proposal that went before voters was the first time they have been asked to approve the revamped plans for improvements to school buildings.
“It was very close. We’re going to put it back up” to voters, he said.
Plans are to turn Seaborn Elementary into a grades K-6 building from a K-4 building, and add grades 7 and 8 to the high school to make it a grades 7-12 building.
Part of Seaborn will be torn down including the portion of the building constructed in 1959. The 1999 and 2001 portions will remain.
The high school will be added onto, with an entirely separate section for junior high to be built behind the current classrooms. Eight new classrooms will be constructed for the junior high section, and windows and doors in the remainder of the building will be replaced.
The middle school, which is expensive to maintain because the building is 90 years old, will be partly torn down, leaving the gymnasium for the junior-high gym, the administrative offices which are to be renovated, and the bus garage at the back of the building.
The district lost a chance at a different project, which was expected to cost $19 million through OFSC, in 2009 after two failed attempts to get a 6.4-mill bond issue to generate $8.4 million and a 1.6-mill permanent-improvement levy failed.