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The board met in a special session to discuss several plans. No action was taken, but the board tentatively agreed to purchase a building and present voters with a scaled down version of a referendum that failed in November.
The purchase would come out of the district’s fund balance, potentially eating into reserves.
“There’s a concern (about using the fund balance), but we have to do something about the space issue,” district superintendent Bruce Montplaisir said.
The board will meet Jan. 12 to discuss the plans. Members will likely vote on purchasing a building owned by Bryan Benson at 90 Benson Drive in Lewiston for about $390,000. An additional plot of land for a playground may be purchased for $40,000.
The building would house pre-school and early education classes, currently split between the elementary school and space in a church the district leases. The purchase would negate the district’s need to move fourth-graders from its elementary school to its intermediate school, limiting its need for space there.
Board members hoped the decision would make a referendum more palatable to voters. Two referendums totalling about $4.4 million that would have expanded the intermediate school and added improvements failed in November.
The new referendum would be under $2 million, and the expansion would be about a third the size of the original plan.
No date was decided for the next referendum. Several members suggested it should at least wait until November. Board member Kevin Medin suggested tough economic times would make building support for a tax increase hard so soon after a previous one was voted down.
“Getting anything passed is hard right now, no matter how desperately you need it,” he said.
Bryan wrote on Jan 9, 2009 12:10 AM:
Lewiston school board: Wake up call! Maybe you should rethink purchasing property from Benson? Lewiston just took a HUGE tax base hit. "