A growing district asks voters to fund new construction. Voters decline each time.
Two referendums for a new elementary and middle school fail
The district buys 43 acres at Crane and Silver Glen Roads for a combined school campus, but ballot measures to fund construction are defeated in back-to-back years. The land goes unbuilt.
A "no tax rate increase" referendum is defeated, 53% to 47%
The district asks to swap retiring bonds for $114 million in new ones at a flat tax rate, to remodel Thompson and Wredling and rebuild Haines and Davis. Voters say no, choosing the tax reduction instead.
With no new construction money, the district reorganizes inside existing walls.
Davis and Richmond become paired grade-level centers
Overcrowded Davis and under-enrolled Richmond are combined into Davis Primary (K-2) and Richmond Intermediate (3-5). The pairing lasts until the district returns every elementary to a K-5 model in 2024.
Declining enrollment and the risk of reduced state funding drive the biggest decision of the decade: close Haines, modernize Thompson and Wredling, and do it without a referendum.
The board prepares a referendum, then asks the community first
The board directs staff to draft a November 2016 ballot question of up to $60 million and holds public forums on three options, all closing Haines. A summer survey finds residents support two upgraded middle schools but do not want a tax increase to pay for them.
The $50 million middle school plan passes with no ballot question
Upgrade Wredling, rebuild and expand Thompson, close Haines as a middle school by fall 2019, saving $2.4M per year. Funded from four sources, none requiring a referendum: a $7.8M State of Illinois construction grant, $19.3M from the district's fund balance (accumulated savings), $15M in working cash bonds issued within the district's existing non-referendum debt authority, and $7.9M in operating dollars: a $1.7M budget surplus plus annual budget allocations across 2016-19, largely the savings from closing Haines.
Wredling upgrades finish
The cafeteria is expanded to host the larger student body that consolidation brings. Ten science classrooms receive more limited interior renovations, including updated casework, within the rooms' existing footprints. Meanwhile, Thompson students are split between two buildings during construction: younger grades attend Thompson itself, using areas not under construction, while older grades attend the Haines building. All three grades are together in the completed Thompson for 2019-20.
Fox Ridge becomes the Early Childhood Center
With elementary enrollment down and Fox Ridge at 69% of capacity, the board votes 6-1 to convert it to early childhood use and redraws elementary boundaries. About 600 students districtwide change schools; the change saves roughly $280K per year.
The old construction bonds retire, and taxes drop
Following the district's 2016 decision not to replace the retiring debt, the annual bond levy falls from roughly $21M to under $5M when the old bonds are paid off in 2018. The owner of a $300,000 home sees school taxes drop by roughly $600 per year.
Haines closes as a school; the rebuilt Thompson opens
Thompson nearly doubles to about 196,000 square feet: 31 new classrooms, 11 science labs, air conditioning, a second gym, and an expanded cafeteria. The community open house is August 20, 2019.
Instead of selling or demolishing closed buildings, the district puts them back to work, and starts its first true facilities master plan.
Haines gets a $4 million second life
By a 5-2 vote, the board demolishes the building's oldest wing and renovates the rest: two new classrooms and a home for the Transition Program (young adults 18-22 with an IEP), space that today houses Compass Academy, district instruction offices, and a board room. The Park District uses the gym and music rooms; the Public Library rents space during its own renovation.
Compass Academy opens at Haines
A small districtwide high school of choice, Compass Academy, with flexible schedules and project-based, competency-based learning, opens with about 90 students. It remains at the Haines Center today.
New guiding principles, minimum space standards, and capacity data drive a coordinated set of moves: three buildings change roles in a single plan.
The master plan gets its rules
The board adopts 13 facility guiding principles and hires demographers RSP & Associates to study enrollment and capacity building by building. The finding: enrollment is stable overall, but students and classroom space are in the wrong places.
Every school is measured against minimum space standards
The standards require at least 18 core classrooms plus dedicated space for specials and student services. Lincoln, with 12 classrooms, cannot meet them; several west-side schools are over capacity. Seven scenarios are publicly costed, including buying an office building and building a new early childhood center.
Scenario D passes unanimously: three buildings trade places
Effective fall 2024, per the approved board memo: Fox Ridge reopens as a K-5 elementary. Early Childhood moves to a renovated wing at Haines. Lincoln is repurposed for the Transition Program and a Professional Learning Center in its former gym. Estimated cost $14.6M, funded with long-term borrowing within the district's existing authority.
Sharpening the pencil on Lincoln
Rather than build out staff office space at Lincoln, the board buys an existing warehouse and office building at 602 Sidwell Court for $1.1M. The purchase removes $1.75M of planned Lincoln construction, including the staff office buildout and its planned elevator, for a net savings of about $650K. Lincoln's final scope: the Transition Program and the Professional Learning Center.
$23 million of construction gets the buildings ready
About $6.5M at Lincoln, roughly $5.3M in construction contracts approved in February 2024 plus abatement and site work, for the Transition wing with ADA improvements and the Professional Learning Center. About $8.6M at Haines (early childhood classrooms, two new playgrounds). The aging, outdated mobile classrooms at North and East High Schools are demolished; they are not replaced with brick and mortar classrooms, so the district operates with fewer classrooms than before. The work is paid for with non-referendum bonds: borrowing repaid within the district's existing debt limits, not a voter-approved tax increase. New attendance boundaries, approved February 2024, take effect and end the Davis-Richmond pairing.
The district keeps investing where it can, gives its most-moved students a permanent home, and puts the full picture in front of the community.
ACCESS classrooms consolidate at three schools
ACCESS, serving elementary students with autism, grew from 7 students in 2017 to nearly 50, and its classrooms moved repeatedly as buildings filled. The board votes 5-1 to consolidate the program at Corron, Fox Ridge, and Munhall, choosing Corron for its dedicated therapy and sensory spaces.
Richmond Elementary grows
A $6.35M addition and renovation: two new classrooms, updated learning spaces, a new gym floor, partial roof replacement, and full sprinkler coverage. Ground broke February 19, 2026; finished for the 2026-27 school year.
A community committee sizes the real need: $295.6 million
The Communitywide Education Facilities Committee (staff, parents, students, and residents) spends five months touring schools and reviewing data. It identifies roughly $187M in deferred maintenance and recommends $295.6M in improvements across 16 projects. The process is staffed by Chief School Business Official Jennifer Porter and Executive Director of Facilities Amanda Stuber, who joined the district in 2023. Whether to place a referendum on the November 2026 ballot is the School Board's next decision, and if it does, the final decision belongs to voters.
Three honest takeaways
1. The tax savings were real. Voters declined new bonds three times, and in 2016 the administration chose not to seek voter approval for a "no tax increase" referendum before the old bonds retired in 2018. Homeowners kept roughly $600 a year per $300,000 of home value. We are here, in part, because of those decisions.
2. So is the backlog. Buildings age whether or not they are funded. Two decades of working around the ballot box, lawfully and publicly, kept schools open and taxes low, and left about $187 million of deferred maintenance behind.
3. The people changed; the problem stayed. No current School Board member served on the board that made the 2016 decision, and three superintendents have served across this timeline: Don Schlomann (2007 to 2017), Jason Pearson (2017 to 2022), and Paul Gordon (July 2022 to present). Today's leaders inherited this history. What happens next is up to the community.
