HANCOCK COUNTY — Mt. Vernon officials gave their final approval for projects to accommodate the school district’s expected growth, paving the way for up to about $84 million in improvements over the next several years.
Those plans include building a new elementary school; turning a current one into an intermediate school; improving traffic flow at the district’s main campus; and constructing a new transportation center. Leaders and their advisers don’t expect to have to raise taxes in the school district to pay for them.
The school board’s unanimous approval earlier this week sheds light on more details of the path they chose to follow late last year and early this year.
Mt. Vernon has about 4,300 students and is projected to add almost 2,000 by the 2028-29 school year. To help make room for them, the district plans to build a new elementary school for pre-kindergarten through fourth grade. Greg Elkins, Mt. Vernon’s officer said the new school would likely go on part of about 37 acres east of County Road 200W north of the middle school and administration building that the school corporation recently bought for about $800,000.
To save on costs, Mt. Vernon is going with a design for the new school that its hired architecture firm, Indianapolis-based Lancer + Beebe, already designed — Walnut Grove Elementary School in Bargersville, which opened in 2019.
Elkins said that school’s color scheme, parking features and other ancillary attributes wouldn’t necessarily be replicated for Mt. Vernon’s new school.
“It’s a basic outline, a basic design idea that we have chosen to follow for our building,” he said.
The project is estimated to occur between late 2021 and 2024.
“We already know, due to tracking our enrollment trends, how the pandemic has impacted us,” Elkins said. “We believe we will not need to have the doors open to the new elementary school until the 2024-2025 school year. And should enrollment slow down any between now and our implementation of this plan, we certainly could and would push back the opening of that elementary.”
Mt. Vernon’s new transportation center, projected to be developed between 2021 and 2023, would also go on that 37-acre property.
The school corporation is selling about 67 acres at the northeast corner of County Road 100N and Mt. Comfort Road for nearly $1.8 million to help pay for its recent land purchase.
It’s also seeking about 19 acres east of its administration building for space needed to add parking lots and improve traffic flow on the main campus. Elkins said the corporation is in the final stages of due diligence for that acquisition, with a tentative closing date sometime in early August.
The traffic flow improvements would occur from 2021 to 2024, according to Mt. Vernon’s projected timeline.
“We’re going to be focusing on creating access between County Road 200W and (State Road) 234,” Elkins said.
Mt. Vernon’s plans also call for turning Fortville Elementary School into an intermediate school for grades five and six and adding about a dozen classrooms onto the building’s south side, a project expected to take place between 2022 and 2024. The property, originally built as an intermediate school, would create room at the district’s elementary schools by taking on their fifth graders while also making space at the middle school by serving its sixth-graders.
The school corporation anticipates a maximum $84.25 million bond issue to fund the improvements.
Mt. Vernon’s current debt obligations are backed by a tax rate of about $1.18, which is set to drop next year as debt gets fulfilled. Luke Bruggeman of Stifel, Mt. Vernon’s bond underwriter, said that provides an opportunity to borrow for the upcoming projects without needing to increase taxes.
“There is plenty of capacity going forward in the tax rate,” Bruggeman said.
Mt. Vernon’s growth plans at a glance:
- Improvements to main campus traffic flow
- Relocation of transportation department and construction of new bus facility
- Construction of new elementary school
- Additional instructional space at Fortville Elementary School (to become intermediate school for grades 5-6)
- Max $84.25 million bond issue