The Buildings & Grounds Committee of the Indiana Area School Board will hold a meeting tonight to discuss “Option Four” of its elementary school building alternatives. The committee members will be focusing on the possibility of renovating the Ben Franklin Elementary School, upgrading the East Pike and Eisenhower elementary schools, and closing the Horace Mann school.
This is the final meeting on the four options. Option One would keep all four schools open with minimal upgrades; Option Two would close Ben Franklin, add classrooms to the Eisenhower and East Pike schools, and update Horace Mann and East Pike;
Option Three would build a new Ben Franklin school, close Horace Mann, and update East Pike and Eisenhower. That plan, which was largely the plan a previous school board advanced and which led to an election uprising two years ago, was again rejected by the public last month and the school board members agreed.
Option Four tonight will meet with resistance from members of the public who have objected to closing Horace Mann.
The meeting tonight is at 6 PM at the East Pike boardroom. The public is encouraged to attend and participate.
Also tonight, the Marion Center School Board meets for a work session tonight with the district budget on the agenda. Discussion items will include a recommendation to approve a spending plan in the amount of $25,568,076.
The budget would include a real estate tax increase of .044 mills, which equates to .382 percent, and would increase the average residential homeowner’s taxes by just under six dollars over the course of a year. The new taxes would offset taxpayers’ participation in the Clean & Green program.
There are a number of personnel and other preparatory items for the new school year on tonight’s agenda.
The Purchase Line School Board will also meet tonight. They have not published an agenda.
