Ascension schools fine-tune project list
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A proposed list of school improvements includes $16 million to replace G.W. Carver Primary School and $15 million in new additions to Prairieville Middle School, according to a list provided Monday by Chad Lynch, Ascension Parish Schools’ director of Planning and Construction.
The board decided last week to ask Ascension voters to extend a property tax to fund these two projects, and a list of renovations and upgrades to 17 other schools.
The projects were pared down from a $216 million “needs list” that Planning and Construction compiled based on the input of each school’s administration, Assistant Superintendent Patrice Pujol said Monday.
The process began in September, Pujol said, in order to implement recommendations made by the Southern Association of Accreditation of Colleges and Schools, the regional accreditation agency for an 11-state area, including Louisiana.
“They suggested we take a hard look at our facilities,” Pujol said, “and that list is needs — not a wish list.”
Much of the list includes upgrades of electrical systems to accommodate technology in older facilities, elimination of temporary buildings, security cameras on all campuses and upgrades to the system’s data network.
The preliminary list was punted to architects, compared with lists of ongoing projects to eliminate duplications, and funneled through the School Board’s Strategic Planning Committee to get that list down to the $104 million project list.
“We wanted to fund it without raising the existing millage rate,” Superintendent Donald Songy said. “It’s a hard enough sell without raising the millage.”
The list will go before the board for final approval at a July 6 meeting, Pujol said, “and it could still change somewhat between now and then.”
The bond issue will go before the Bond Commission on July 23, Songy said, and the tax extension will go before voters Oct. 17.
The 15.08-mill property tax was first approved in October 2005. The 20-year tax is scheduled to expire in 2025, and the current request would extend that millage through 2029.
A resident with a $200,000 home, subtracting the $75,000 homestead exemption, pays $1,885 per year under the current tax.
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