Fewer projects. More money. CMS’ bond referendum proposal is now $2.997 billion
A nearly $3 billion Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools bond proposal drew relatively few comments during a public hearing Tuesday night, even though it could be the largest such request in North Carolina history if placed on 2023 ballots.
CMS is crafting a comprehensive plan for facilities, boundaries and programs as it readies for a November bond referendum. If the $2.997 billion stands, it would be the largest-ever public school district bond referendum put to voters in North Carolina, said Charles Jeter, the executive director for government affairs, policy and board services for CMS.
The project will allow CMS to address capacity issues and get students out of outdated schools, Dennis LaCaria, a CMS consultant, told the district’s board at its Tuesday meeting.
“We have to have buildings in order to teach our students, and we have to have buildings in sufficient condition to do that well, so everything starts with a building,” he said.
The $2.997 billion includes 30 projects, with most involving new school buildings on existing properties. That includes covering costs for three new middle schools and a west regional athletic complex. The list was whittled down from an initial list of 125 total projects with a price tag of more than $5 billion to 40 projects with a price tag of $2.88 billion. The new estimates reflect prices adjusted for inflation through 2028, CMS officials say.
What’s in the bond proposal?
Multiple high schools are on the proposed list of 30 projects. At these schools — Garinger, South Mecklenburg, North Mecklenburg and East Mecklenburg — there would be continued work or replacement schools, where new facilities are built on current sites.
Several elementary schools are on the list for replacement schools: Beverly Woods, Huntersville, Matthews, Steele Creek and Cornelius as well as Albemarle Road Middle School. Allenbrook Elementary, Villa Heights Elementary and the Berryhill School will get off-site replacements.
Wilson STEM Academy, Coulwood STEM Academy and Cochrane Collegiate Academy also would get on-site replacements.
The plan does not involve CMS buying any new properties, LaCaria told the board, instead using land already owned by the district.
It typically takes seven to eight years to build everything in a bond package, Jeter said.
The last CMS bond package voters approved in 2017 was just shy of $1 billion, which was CMS’ largest ever at the time.
From the 2017 bond package, $119.6 million remains to cover 15 projects. Of those, 12 are under construction and three are in the design phase. Voters in Mecklenburg County last rejected a school bond referendum in 2005, when 57% of voters said “no” to $427 million to build and renovate schools.
What are people saying?
Adding middle schools and renovating or rebuilding some elementary and high schools will help alleviate issues with crowding in some CMS schools, LaCaria told the board.
“When we have sufficient capacity, we can get students out of portable classrooms, adjust boundaries, provide relief,” he said. “We can offer magnet seats, expand magnet programmatic offerings. More importantly, we can make sure that the buildings in which our magnets are housed can actually support the magnet so that those can be done with fidelity.”
More than 105 CMS schools were “at or over capacity” at the end of the last school year, district Chief Operations Officer Brian Schultz said.
“I’ve heard, ‘Well, you don’t need the space.’ 105 schools would beg to differ,” he said. “And we did gain 1,000 students in the district this school year.”
Many of the comments from the public Tuesday centered on its potential impacts on CMS magnet programs.
District officials made a presentation to the board about the effects of the bond proposal on magnets, including programs in the creative arts, world language immersion and Montessori programs.
Multiple parents and students praised the proposal to add world language programs at Garinger High School, saying the move would be beneficial to east Charlotte families whose students are already in language immersion programs at the elementary school level in the area.
Fincher Nelson and Kelly Ammons, both third-graders at Charlotte East Language Academy, told the board they’re eager to continue taking classes in Spanish and want to have advanced Spanish classes readily available when they reach high school.
“And we want to go to high school in east Charlotte,” Fincher said.
Parent Talla Rittenhouse said she hopes to see the district “come up with creative solutions” to keep schools at their current sites rather than moving them to larger plots of land.
“We need to hold on to our land and figure out how to best use it,” she said. “We don’t want suburban solutions in urban areas. We need urban solutions in urban areas.”
What’s next?
The school board will vote on the bond package at its meeting Feb. 28. Then, school officials will present the plan to county commissioners as a bond request March 4 at a joint meeting of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education and Mecklenburg Board of County Commissioners.
If county commissioners approve the plan, it will go to the Local Government Commission, which State Treasurer Dale Folwell chairs.
The LGC “has a statutory duty to approve most debt issued by units of local government and public authorities in the state,” according to the North Carolina Department of State Treasurer. The commission decides whether the amount of money is reasonable for proposed projects and confirms the debt can be repaid, among other things.
In 2022, the LGC approved applications for nearly $2.5 billion in school bonds for four counties, according to a news release from the department. It included $1.7 billion for Guilford County that was delayed to get more information.
After CMS’ bond package goes through those steps, it’ll be on Mecklenburg County ballots in 2023.
This story was originally published February 14, 2023 at 10:07 PM.
