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District Office Construction Update |
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by Mark S. Lewis, Ed.D, Superintendent of the Lansing Central School District
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Friday, 17 November 2006 |
 In October, the Lansing Central School District Board of Education gave the green light to the district administration and architects to take the next steps towards placing a construction proposition before the district’s voters during February 2007. One of the issues that is yet to be resolved is the fate of the district office. The current district office is plagued with many structural and space limitation problems that the board feels must be addressed within the current construction initiative. On November 2, 2006, the board held a special meeting to review various options for addressing the district office situation. Both on-campus and off-campus solutions were considered, with the board leaning towards pursuit of an on-campus solution. This ruled out some off-campus lease options that were being investigated. There are some clear advantages in terms of state aid for a solution within one of the existing school buildings. The state aid formulas provide over 62% state aid for conversion of existing classroom space into district office space, even if it results in the need to construct new classrooms to offset those taken for offices. The formulas will provide a similar level of aid for those classrooms as well. Conversely, the state provides no aid for construction of district offices beyond the walls of existing schools. This is an anomaly of the state aid formulas that has been in existence for over half a century.
The current status of the quest to resolve the district office situation includes the retrofitting of four high school classrooms for district use and adding four additional classrooms to the overall building footprint. This solution is one of the most economical ones currently being reviewed. While the final decision has not been made by the board regarding the location of the district office, placing it in the high school for design purposes allows the architectural firm and district administration to continue to complete the process of submitting all necessary forms and plans to the state education department for preliminary review, yet permits last minute changes to the design if a more desirable or economical solution is discovered. The board will complete all actions pertaining to a February 2007 voter referendum no later than the December 14 2006 board meeting. A comprehensive community information initiative will then commence and continue up to the day of the vote. ----
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