Category Archives: SPLOST

Chesnut ES and Kingsley ES Not a Fan of Their School Board Rep

Posted on November 4, 2016 by | 68 comments

[poll id=”3″]Open Letter To:
DeKalb County School District Board of Education
CC: Superintendent Green; Ramona Tyson (Superintendent’s Office) ; Erika Harris ; John Heneghan (Dunwoody City Council) ; Sherry Johnson (Region I Superintendent) ; council@chesnutelementary.com; Chad Griffith (DHS School Council Chair) mcgriffith@griffitheng.com; Allegra Johnson (PCMS Foundation Chair) ajwigwam@bellsouth.net; ciwillard@yahoo.com;
Date: November 1, 2016
From:
Chesnut Elementary Parent Teacher Council
Contact: Terri Young, Chair
chair@chesnutelementary.com
Kingsley Elementary Parent Teacher Organization
Contact: Carrie Willard
ciwillard@yahoo.com

Dear Board Members:
We are writing to ensure fair and accurate representation for the Chesnut and Kingsley communities, whose desire to remain at local, walkable secondary schools was expressed in the Peachtree Charter Middle School (PCMS) and Dunwoody High School (DHS) council letters, which advocated for a 2017-2022 E-SPLOST V project plan that funds PCMS and DHS building additions.
In addition to the district’s efforts to collect community feedback in its multiple community meetings and online survey as part of the Secondary School Facility Planning and Feasibility Study, Kingsley and Chesnut community members have participated in the following forums:
• Aug. 30 – Representatives from every school in the Dunwoody cluster except Hightower (invited, but could not attend) met and formed consensus to keep cluster intact;
• Sept. 8 and Sept. 14 – Kingsley PTO held informational meetings for its families;
• Sept. 9 and Sept. 13 – Chesnut PTC sent informational letter to parents and discussed at PTC meeting;
• Sept. 13 – Kingsley and Chesnut families attended DHS council meeting where we voiced our support for an amended Option B with buildout to PCMS and DHS.
As a result, the DHS and PCMS letters to the county and the feasibility study’s recommendations all reflect the input we gathered from the Kingsley and Chesnut school communities: allow our students to remain Dunwoody cluster students by growing the capacity at the middle and high schools, rather than rezoning portions of our socioeconomically diverse neighborhoods out of the Dunwoody cluster.
However, now, due to recent commentary that has been circulating in online neighborhood forums, on our Board of Education Region 1 Representative’s blog (http://factchecker.stanjester.com), and in the October 19, 2016 Dunwoody Crier article, “Opposition Develops to DHS, PCMS Additions,” we are concerned that our views will not be represented in the December BOE vote. Our board representative has in fact taken a position contrary to that given by the DHS and PCMS councils, as he stated in the aforementioned Dunwoody Crier article:

“We can’t add 600 seats to the high school every 5 to 10 years; it’s not scalable. And there’s really been no coordination with the city of Dunwoody or other DeKalb cities in regards to the impact on traffic and stormwater. Given these cities and the county must permit and allow these additions, it seems odd that the school district wouldn’t be working with cities and the county in the development stage.” – Stan Jester, Region 1 BOE Representative

By promoting the misconception that 600 students will be added to the high school, Mr. Jester — who surely knows that in fact the plan allows for an enrollment of 267 net new students by 2022 (as DHS’ current enrollment already stands at 321 over capacity) — can only be attempting to incite opposition to the DHS addition.
We look forward to collaborating with our city and county to develop solutions to the issues of traffic and parking at DHS. With community bodies, like Saint Luke’s Church, entering into partnerships with DHS to provide safe and accessible parking for our students, it is evident that there are resolutions for these concerns that will positively benefit neighbors surrounding the school as well as DHS students and families. Furthermore, we believe that our neighbors throughout Dunwoody would certainly not like to see these concerns supersede a socioeconomically diverse Dunwoody cluster that allows families who sought residency within the cluster to remain within the cluster. We thank you in advance for considering our views when you vote on the Facility Master Plan in your December 2016 meeting.
Thank you for your consideration,
Chesnut Elementary Parent Teacher Council
Contact: Terri Young, Chair
chair@chesnutelementary.com
Kingsley Elementary Parent Teacher Organization
Contact: Carrie Willard
ciwillard@yahoo.com

68 Comments

Posted in SPLOST

Chamblee Charter High School – 600 Seat Addition

Posted on November 2, 2016 by | 121 comments
[poll id=”3″]

DeKalb Schools will bring to the board on Monday a recommendation to construct a 600-seat, three-story addition to Chamblee Charter High School. The project will also include

  • 116 space parking lot in front of school fronting Chamblee Dunwoody Rd
  • Kitchen extension (984 sq/ft)
  • Cafeteria extension (1,891 sq/ft)
  • Media center expansion (2,647 sq/ft)
  • 2 story employee parking garage

Note: This project will not include any renovations or additions to existing art rooms, locker rooms, band room, choir room, gymnasium, fields, or any other core spaces or surrounding infrastructure.
What are your thoughts?

Conceptual Plan
The following plans represent a conceptual approach to locating building additions and site modifications at the schools recommended for additions and reconfiguration. These conceptual plans are intended for the purpose of determining feasibility only.
click to enlarge

Enrollment/Capacity – Chamblee Charter High School (Oct 2016)
Chamblee Charter High School currently has 1,624 students enrolled and is expected to have 2,328 students (518 students over current capacity) by year 2022.

Enrollment By Grade (Oct 2016) Total Total Available Percent
School 9 10 11 12 Enrollment Capacity Seats Capacity Portables
Chamblee Charter HS 514 426 361 323 1,624 1,810 186 90%

Recommendation
The administration recommends constructing a 600-seat, three-story addition extending the current footprint and bringing the school to 120 classrooms.
Core Areas
The classroom addition and resulting increased capacity will require modifications to the school’s common areas – media center, kitchen and cafeteria. Previously these expansions were indicated as additions to the footprint of the building, but further analysis shows that the media center and cafeteria expansion requirements can be better accommodated by expanding within the building itself. These modifications will expand core areas by 5,522 -square-ft.
Cost

August Round 3 Estimates Cost September Final Recommendation Change in Seats Estimates Change In Funding
1 600 seat addition at Dunwoody HS $23 million 600 seats (2,100 seat capacity) 0 $16.4 million – 29%
2 450 seat addition at Peachtree MS $17 million 450 seats (1,700 seat capacity) 0 $13.9 million – 18%
3 900 seat addition at Lakeside HS $34 million 750 seats (2,500 seat capacity) – 17% $22.1 million – 35%
4 500 seat addition at Chamblee HS $19 million 600 seats (2,400 seat capacity) + 17% $16.4 million – 14%

The estimated total cost of the proposed recommendation has flucuated over the last few months. It was recently reduced to $16.4 million but is currently $21,200,000.

Total Budget Cost includes direct construction costs, Arch/Eng. fees, site testing fees, furniture/fixtures/equipment, and project contingencies. These costs were developed from historical cost information compiled by School Planning and Management, in their Annual School Construction Report 2015, Region 5 (Southeast United States) cost per student for new high schools. These costs were then inflation adjusted for year 2019.
Student Moves
It estimated that an additional 400 students will be redistricted from Cross Keys HS to Chamblee Charter HS. It is also estimated that roughly 250 students will be redistricted out of Chamblee HS and in Cross Keys HS
Board of Education Meeting
These recommendations will be presented to the board at the end of the 2pm business meeting this coming Monday. There will be public comment at 5:45pm. The board is expected to vote on this in December. You may get on the list to speak this Monday at public comment by emailing Margaret_Francois (Margaret_Francois@dekalbschoolsga.org)

121 Comments

Posted in Chamblee High School, SPLOST