By Naomi Inman
Cascade’s President and CEO, John Charles, emailed a Memo on Monday to Portland Public School Board members in anticipation of the October 14 meeting to approve final designs for Jefferson, Cleveland and Wells high school modernization plans.
His memo referenced the Bond Accountability Committee (BAC) Report which audits PPS construction bonds and projects. The BAC concluded by raising concerns over PPS high school construction.
“The BAC would like to share the opinion that the district should not be building such large high schools when there is not the student body to justify it. Given declining enrollment and decreasing birth rates this issue is even more pronounced given the project budget issues.”
Both the Willamette Week’s reporting and the BAC Report are sounding a quiet alarm about the failure of PPS to use demographic and enrollment data in properly sizing future high schools.
Nonetheless, the PPS Board voted on Tuesday to move ahead with building Jefferson, Cleveland and Wells high schools as planned with capacity for 1,700 each, regardless of demographic data from Portland State University’s Population Research Center. Chairman Eddie Wang argues that size reduction is “unfair” while failing to explain how empty buildings would actually improve student performance.
The district is projected to have about 3,000 empty desks in its high schools by 2030-35. That’s the equivalent of two empty high schools. Even now, talks of school consolidation under current enrollment numbers are already underway.
One example of a recent overbuild is Benson High School, which has about 900 students in a building with capacity for 1,700 students. Do Portland taxpayers want to spend $1 billion in new construction bonds on building expensive and empty classrooms?
On the flip side, Charles offered a better example in Beaverton High School.
“They are building a three-story building…for 1,500 students. They plan to demolish the existing high school except for the cafeteria. In future years the cafeteria could be replaced with another three-story building if enrollment goes up.
“All three PPS high schools could be designed for enrollments anticipated in the next five years and expanded later if necessary. You would save hundreds of millions of dollars from the 2025 bond, which could be used for other construction needs.”
The PPS Bond Accountability Committee meets quarterly to review bond funded projects and offer advice to the School Board. Their due diligence produced serious observations.
While the PPS Board got the memo, they have chosen to ignore it. By moving ahead with over-sized and over-priced schools, they will accelerate the district’s slide in a fiscal crisis they already face. It is the taxpayers and students who will ultimately pay the price.
Click here for PDF version of this commentary
Click here for PDF of John Charles’ Oct. 13 Memo to the PPS School Board
Naomi Inman is the External Relations Manager at Cascade Policy Institute, Oregon’s free market public policy research organization.
