PORT TOWNSEND — The community still has mixed feelings about what exactly to do with Port Townsend schools, though a Saturday town meeting indicated many residents like the idea of consolidating facilities.
About 100 people showed up for the combined city-school district town meeting Saturday morning, and most arrived with an abundance of ideas.
Although the meeting was designed for the community to look at the long-term needs of the town’s aging schools, it stopped short of lobbying for a school bond measure on the November ballot to build a new Grant Street school.
Long discussions dominated most of the afternoon.
The most elaborate talks focused on school district facilities: what would work best, what needed to be modified and what needed to be removed from a series of existing plans.
City Planner Rick Sepler said workshop results would a crucial ingredient in the final plan.
“The next meeting will show what our plan in now [after listening to the responses],” Sepler said.
“Then we will ask what you think of it.”
The next town meeting will be at 6 p.m. Oct. 21 at the Blue Heron Middle School auditorium, 3939 San Juan Ave., Port Townsend.
Sepler said that will be the time for big-picture questions and large revisions.
“It should be an exciting, dynamic meeting,” he said.
The Oct. 21 meeting will again address the district’s facilities and continue to hammer out a plan designed by the community.
Instant polling available at the meeting included a series of questions pertaining to work accomplished so far.
When asked if the district should consider consolidating elementary schools, 95 percent of respondents said yes.
However, there was some disagreement on which elementary school should bear the load of all the districts K-5 students.
Fifty-five percent felt Grant Street was the better location, while 45 percent opted for Mountain View Elementary.
When asked if the district needed to construct a new building or expand an existing facility, 81 percent said yes.
All results from the meetings are being posted on the city’s Web site (www.cityofpt.us).
A few people in the crowd took issue with the queries, yelling during the polling that they were being asked leading questions.
Sepler said there was no intention to lead anyone down a particular path.
“The intent was to go back and ask questions which came up in the groups at the meeting before,” he said.
“We are striving to the greatest intent possible to reach your goals.
“And the proof will be in the pudding. You will see it when we present the plan [at the next meeting]”
The meetings have stopped short of pushing for the school bond that’s on the Nov. 4 general election ballot.
The school district is asking voters to approve a $35.6 million bond that would primarily finance construction of a new school on the Grant Street campus.
If voters approve the bond, all elementary school students would be housed there in 2010 after Mountain View Elementary School is closed.
Also included in the measure is funding for maintenance upgrades at the district’s other schools, bus storage and maintenance shop repairs and district communications upgrades totaling about $1.34 million.
The bond would raise the property tax rate in the school district by 54 cents per $1,000 of assessed valuation.
If voters approve the measure, the owner of a $362,000 house — the median price of a house in Jefferson County — would pay $195 more in property taxes.
City Planner Rick Sepler said the meetings are not intended to move forward the bond’s agenda.
“This is not about the bond,” Sepler said at the Sept. 18 meeting.
“What you hear tonight will likely help you make your decision, but it’s not about the bond.”
Sepler also said the meetings are not about the pool, which is costing the school district and the city more money in operational costs than what’s been budgeted.
The pool was a topic that came up in every group discussion but will likely end up as a separate process.
Still, the instant polling did ask if the community should construct a new pool.
Eighty-six percent of respondents said yes.
“The pool is a symptom of the problems we are addressing,” Sepler said.
“What we are asking is what direction to go in from here,” he said.
“There are no wrong answers. We want to find answers that resonate. No good idea will go unexplored.”
Reporter Erik Hidle can be reached at 360-385-2335 or erik.hidle@peninsuladailynews.com.
