With rising construction costs, CMS scales back classrooms for 3 planned high schools

The Charlotte-Mecklenburg school board voted to change three of the high schools in the list of 2017 bond projects, downsizing them from 125 classrooms to 100 each.

The board approved the recommendation from Superintendent Earnest Winston in a 7-2 vote, with Sean Strain and Ruby Jones opposed.

Before the vote, CMS staff gave the school board an update on the bond projects, including construction costs increases that have pushed the projects over the $922 million that voters had approved.

Dennis LaCaria, who previously worked in school construction at CMS and is now a consultant for the district, said that projects in both the public and private sector are facing unexpected rising construction costs. While the district budgeted for a cost escalation of about 11%, the actual rise in prices has been closer to 20%.

LaCaria emphasized that cost was not a driving factor in the decisions being made on the bond projects, and both CMS staff and board members have said that all the projects on the 2017 bond will be delivered.

“At no point in time did we say, ‘We want to move from 125 classrooms to 100 to save a dollar,’” LaCaria said. “I would never come to this board and say, ‘We need to shortchange a child.’”

CMS has asked Mecklenburg County for additional money to complete the 2017 projects, and to purchase land for the south Charlotte relief school.

In its presentation, CMS said that the change in the number of classrooms would not affect the enrollment at any of the schools. Akeshia Craven-Howell, associate superintendent for student assignment and school choice, said that all the schools would have a capacity of 2,500 students and would still have extra seats even after five-year growth projections.

Craven-Howell said that the 125-classroom number was based on an assumption of 20 students per classroom, but that in high schools, 25 students per classroom was a more accurate estimate.

Board members questioned whether that decision was appropriate, pointing to exploding development. Jones criticized the lack of communication with the public over changes to the bond construction plan.

“Now you want to talk about being open and transparent with our public, but you haven’t been,” Jones said. “You promised one thing and now you want to go back on it? I think it’s an abomination.”

Jones also criticized CMS for failing to deliver a promise on the west Charlotte high school in particular. About two dozen community members, dressed in West Charlotte High School colors, sat in the crowd and held signs critical of the decision to scale back the number of classrooms. One called it a “bait and switch,” and another read, “This is 2020, not 1969.”

“Total trust is what the voters gave CMS to build schools,” Jones said. “We got out there, and we promoted it that way. Black people helped bring that bond home. And now you’re going to try to sell us the okey-doke?”

Other board members said they would support the new size, and that CMS should consider what the right size high school is for students to have the best experience, especially given the difficulty of managing schools with more than 3,000 students. Board member Margaret Marshall said it was time to “right-size” designs for CMS schools.

“I think the question we’re being asked today is, ‘What does a high school that’s good for kids look like?’” Marshall said. “Let’s get as close as we can to 2,500 because I think that’s right for kids. It’s right for kids in west Charlotte, and it’s right for kids in the south.”

Jones also pressed the district to be innovative in its approach to building new schools, and to stop relying on old assumptions about what works.

“We continue to think in a box about innovative models of learning and teaching,” Jones said. “Well, get out of the darn box.”

The three high schools were intended to replace West Charlotte High School and relieve crowding in Steele Creek and south Charlotte, and each were budgeted for $110 million. But some time in the summer of 2018, CMS pushed back the opening of the south Charlotte school by a year and scaled back the other two schools with little public notice.

Moving forward, Winston said, the district would focus more efforts on soliciting community feedback and will share more information in a series of town hall meetings over the next month.

Those meetings are “an effort to be transparent and to dispel any misinformation and disinformation in the public discussion on the bonds,” Winston said. “It is our intent and our goal to deliver all projects in the 2017 bond.”

The meetings will take place at Northwest School of the Arts on March 9, Providence High School on March 11, East Mecklenburg High School on March 16, and Mallard Creek High School on March 18. All four are scheduled for 6 p.m.

This story was originally published February 26, 2020 at 10:55 AM.