Mitchell Citizens for Progress

School Board Update—-New High School

School board met in special meeting last night at 5:30 PM. There was much discussion about the bids. The base bid option is only the classrooms, lunch room, offices, one practice field with NO GYMs or locker rooms for $45,618,901.😳😳

The only real opposition to all of this was board member Terry Aslesen. Terry brought up nine separate options of what they could do so we could meet the needs of the community. We don’t need new classrooms, we need new athletic facilities because the ones we have are the worst in the state. At a time of great inflation and financial insecurity, the rest of the board members voted for this base bid and now they will have to bring forth a bond issue to the taxpayers. The rest of the school board members voted 4-1 to take the base bid option.

If this bond issue passes, then they can go forward with the other options for gyms, etc. However, one of the options that Terry presented would be that they don’t do these bids and instead take it to a bond issue and vote on the whole package. That failed.

The bond issue, to cover the rest of the school, will be discussed at the next school board meeting which is on February 13. The problem is, as many of you know, is that the school board never had a engineer come in to the existing school and do a feasibility assessment to see if they could renovate and how much it would cost. No, instead, Dr. Graves and Deb Olson believe that they are the professionals and that the community needs a new school. Yes, we definitely need upgrades but could we have done an amazing renovation for less money? We will never know.

Many other cities have done it. Look at Brookings and Omaha for example. But the school board has never been held accountable for this lack of this investigation. Crickets from the media, community leaders or the chamber. Shame on you!

The capital outlay certificates were for 42 million and now we’re at the 45 million mark. Where will this money come from?

Mitchell citizens… It will now have to go to a bond issue and you will vote.

Please stop being complacent and get involved. Bond issue now comes to the community. Next meeting is February 13, 5:30 PM, MCTEA Building to discuss this.