PORT TOWNSEND — The Port Townsend School District is in the final year of a four-year, $4,726,000 levy and still has just over $2 million in unspent levy money.
“We’re in the fourth year and a four-year levy with $2 million,” said school board member Jennifer James-Wilson during Monday night’s meeting. “That means we’ve done everything pretty cost-effectively.”
District business manager Amy Khile said only $446,000 of that is not allocated. That’s due to the new Grant Street Elementary School project.
“All the money was allocated originally,” Khile said. “However, with our new Grant Street project, we don’t need to upgrade the school, so that money will be allocated elsewhere.”
The district had originally planned to make minor upgrades to Grant Street to the tune of $446,000, but the now totally funded new Grant Street school has eliminated the need for those upgrades.
According to Khile, the board has yet to make a decision as to where that money should go.
The rest of the $2 million that is now unspent has been allocated to a variety of projects that are currently in progress or still being discussed by the school board.
“There’s money going toward safety and security and some going toward whatever we decide to do with the Lincoln Building,” Khile said. “There’s also some allocated to the bus barn, which is happening in conjunction with Chimacum.”
According to the district’s levy update presented Monday, $66,000 has been allocated for safety and security system upgrades.
The bus barn project, which will replace the current bus barn, is still in its preliminary stages. According to Superintendent John Polm, tests are being done now to ensure the new location is up to state environmental standards.
“They’re drilling these wells to ensure toxins don’t enter the water table,” Polm said. “With our dry summer, the water table fell, so they’re waiting for it to come back up in order to get an accurate reading.”
The tests are to ensure toxins from the bus barn won’t leech into the water table. A set of positive tests over four months is required.
“It’s still going to be awhile,” Polm said.
An allocation of $488,000 is for the Lincoln Building, though exactly what kinds of updates or safety measures to employ is still being discussed by the school board, according to Khile.
The dilapidated Lincoln Building, which was built in 1894 and is now used only for storage, has been an ongoing problem on the Port Townsend High School campus, according to city Police Officer Troy Surber.
The low lighting and lack of security have made the building and adjacent parking lot a hub of minor burglaries and property damage, Surber said.
Blue Heron Middle School still has $104,000 for unspecified improvements and another $66,000 will go toward new district sidewalks.
That leaves $261,000 for districtwide improvements.
Since it passed in 2012, the levy has been used on a variety of capital projects across the district. According to the district’s levy update, projects have ranged from the fairly minor, such as putting in new lights in the gyms at Blue Heron and Port Townsend High School, to the more involved, such as new bleachers in the high school gym and a new track at Blue Heron.
Also in the district’s long list of completed projects is a new phone system, new flooring in buildings throughout the district, upgrading the roof on the high school gym, new lighting in the high school auditorium, re-roofing the Gael Stuart Building, roof preservation at Blue Heron and a new air system for the high school’s auditorium.
All of this was completed with $2.65 million of the $4.7 million levy.
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Jefferson County Editor/Reporter Cydney McFarland can be reached at 360-385-2335, ext. 55052, or at cmcfarland@peninsuladailynews.com.
