School bond

No one disputes that the Clark County School District has some urgent capital needs in the decade ahead. But how much money does the district really need to complete critical construction, maintenance and upgrades. And the school district’s opening estimate of $5.3 billion is absurdly high.

The School Board is scheduled to convene this morning, when it could opt to put a bond measure before voters in November. The $5.3 billion proposal would increase the district’s property tax take and cost the owner of a $100,000 home an additionalt $74 a year.

A recently expired, $4.9 billion bond authorized in 1998 allowed the district to build 112 new schools over 12 years. But district enrollment is no longer exploding – it’s declining.

The district wants to replace nine schools and build nine new ones to get about 7,000 students out of campuses that have a high reliance on portable classrooms. That would cost less than $500 million. The district also wants to spend $1.6 billion on technology and equipment. That’s about $4.5 million per school, or enough to buy each of the district’s roughly 300,000 students a new laptop or iPad every year for 10 years.

That leaves more than $3 billion for repairs and upgrades, or about $9 million per campus, including the 100 built over the past decade. That’s enough to complete the domed football stadium UNLV hopes to build – times six.

At today’s meeting, trustees hope to have answers from staff on exactly where the money would go. The fact that the district wasn’t able to provide those answers last week makes the proposal seem like a request for a blank check.

Some key questions for the School Board today: Why not build additions and permanent satellite buildings at some schools to replace portables instead of constructing all-new campuses that require new administrators and support staff? Why are routine maintenance costs not accounted for in future budgets? If newer schools need major repairs and renovations, shouldn’t builders be obligated to make them?

Bottom line: $5.3 billion is too much to ask for. Trustees have the option of going much lower, pay-as-you-go style – think less than $1 billion – to eliminate borrowing costs and demonstrate some semblance of frugality.

The School Board should pare back the capital plan.