School leaders poised to make school closure, building and rezoning decisions

By K. BURNELL EVANS (From the Richmond Times-Dispatch website)

As a population surge in South Richmond has some students reporting today to classrooms in modular units, city School Board members are bracing for a year of painful choices about the district’s outdated facilities.

Some schools will close or consolidate, some will be built and district lines across the city will be redrawn under a $563 million framework board members approved this summer.

The plan was one of five options presented at the close of a nearly year-long comprehensive assessment of the needs of Richmond’s 23,000 or so public schools students.

The board’s choice calls for the closure of 14 schools and the construction of seven. Officials have declined to name schools on the chopping block until after community meetings on the plan begin. No dates have been set but the process should begin this fall.

“We’ve got to have a sense of urgency about addressing these long-standing challenges,” said 9th District School Board member Tichi Pinkney Eppes. “We’re talking in many cases about our most pressing needs involving our smallest children.”

Nowhere are those needs more pressing than south of the James River, said Tommy Kranz, an assistant superintendent whose job includes overseeing facilities.

Administrators foresee immediate growth issues with seven of the 12 elementary schools there, and challenges accommodating pockets of growth in middle school enrollment within the next three years.

“The growth in South Side is magnifying the challenges we already have as a district and there’s no one tool that can address all of the challenges,” he said. “It’s complicated and it’s going to take all of the tools at our disposal.”

Parents and caretakers pushing strollers and clutching little hands on their way into Broad Rock Elementary School last Friday passed contractors finalizing the installation of a 12-classroom modular complex.

At nearby E.S.H. Greene Elementary, existing units were replaced and capacity was expanded to include nine classrooms. Each complex has boys and girls bathrooms and a dining area. “Modular units are never our first choice,” said School Board member Derik E. Jones, whose district includes Broad Rock. “But these aren’t trailers; we’ve invested over $1 million in these units.”

The new Broad Rock school opened in 2013 with a capacity of 650 students, but last year had an enrollment of just less than 830. Kranz said the district anticipates enrollment to increase by 70 this year but will not know for certain until numbers level out later this month or early next.

“This is not a permanent solution to problems that are getting worse each year,” Jones said. “What we can’t do is continue with the status quo.”

That was one of four options the board rejected in June, when Kranz presented them with five choices for moving forward with recommendations of the task force co-chaired by board members Kim B. Gray and Kristen Larson.

Similar studies have been conducted in recent decades but were not as comprehensive. “I commend my colleagues for the work they did to advance us to where we are today,” said Eppes, whose district includes Greene. “This is the type of boldness that this board should be known for.”

This summer the board agreed to a schedule that would have them approve recommendations by March. The first phase of the plan is projected to cost about $169 million over five years. The option as presented this summer includes the following changes on the elementary school level: rezone schools in over- and under-crowded regions; consolidate two schools; consolidate one school into an existing school with an addition; combine four schools into two new schools; combine three schools into one new school and one renovated school; renovate existing buildings.

On the secondary school level, four middle schools would be consolidated into two new middle schools; one new high school would be built and one consolidated; and four other secondary schools would be consolidated into two existing locations. District officials have declined to name the affected schools.

Officials plan to hold at least two community meetings on the subject in each district ahead of the board vote with four sessions occurring on Saturdays.

Eppes said she was confident the plan would move forward after discussing the district’s needs with Richmond City Council President Michelle R. Mosby, 9th District. “She has always said, ‘Listen, we’re going to try to find the money,’ ” Eppes said.

kevans@timesdispatch.com (804) 649-6922