Tonight the City Planning Commission went along with the School Board’s request not to carve up the Central site. Its Chairman, Drew Digby, who voted in the minority to proceed with the carving up had little sympathy for the Board even though he himself was a strong Red Plan supporter:
“Planning commission president Drew Digby said the district sounded a bit like Red Plan critics who said they hadn’t been allowed a voice in the process to revamp the school district despite many meetings prior to decisions being made.
“We’ve had a lengthy formal process,” Digby said, urging the commission to pass the recommendation on for a City Council vote, “We need to balance interests here.”
Digby was given a smattering of applause after saying that while the commission needed to respect a unanimous decision by another public body, it also had to respect the process and public input.”
City Staff conceded that the School Board wanted to maximize its return on the property. Here’s a little history:
Dr. Dixon confidently told his followers that the District could sell the property for ten million. This helped justify closing the school. It would be necessary to help pay for the Red Plan. Selling Central for this price was always a tall order. I think Dixon was more interested in the excuse to close the school than seriously planning on such an unlikely sale.
The Red Plan ended up costing fifteen million more than originally specified……wait. It was originally supposed to cost $257 million and got bumped up to $297 million and then $313 million.
These costs have dug deeper into classroom funding making a ten million sale that was never very likely seem imperative. Yet the School Board is caught between its desire to put the biggest tourniquet possible on its operational hemorrhaging or getting some quick small sales that won’t be much better than an aspirin tablet. Of course, the longer the property sits idle the more it cost the District to maintain the site. That will make it further drag on the operations budget.
And to top it off one of the Red Plan’s former champions is making jokes at the Board’s expense. We can only hope that the DNT Editors will come to their rescue with another sympathetic editorial.
