×

Norway schools building and grounds makes case for bond

Guest column

You may have heard from some folks about the Norway-Vulcan Area Schools bond election on our Nov. 5 ballot, but you haven’t heard from me, the Norway building and grounds. I’d like to take a few moments of your time to share some facts about myself with you.

For some of us it may seem like not long ago that I opened. In fact, that was over 30 years ago … so long ago that there were actually only 10 teams in the Big Ten! Imagine! Thirty years ago means that the first students who walked my hallways are parents now and some of them could even be grandparents! Some really nice improvements were made to me with a bond in 2012 — remember what the old high school gym looked like? — but it’s been over a decade since that bond election.

Speaking of 2012, those bonds will be paid off early in 2025. Our school board has timed this election so that, rather than ask for an increase in taxes, new bonds will be sold as the old ones are paid off. Should the bonds be passed, there won’t be a change in how taxes are administered. School board members are community members, too; they wanted to make certain that addressing my needs wouldn’t result in a tax increase.

What needs to be done to keep me in shape? Since 1992, thousands of kids have walked my hallways, sat in my desks, been kept warm by my heat, played on our track and field and so on. That’s a lot of kids! And while I love our kids, as any parent knows, kids are not always the gentlest of folks! Not that I like to tell a lot about my age, but let’s just say that I’ve been well used.

Carpeting in my classrooms and tile flooring in my hallways have seen many thousands of footsteps. You won’t have to look hard to find tile that is cracked and carpet that is just plain worn out. Now imagine if your house were the size I am and what it would cost to replace all of that flooring. It’s not a small number.

Like my flooring, our lockers and furniture have served thousands of kids. Our kids deserve better than patched-together furniture and dented lockers with missing coat hooks in them.

And what about the outside of me? Have you noticed that the bricks in the wall between the elementary and the middle school were so bad that we had to remove them and put up wood paneling in their place?

You may have noticed that my parking lot increasingly resembles a pothole obstacle course. If you head out to our track, you’ll see that pieces of the surface are gone and you can lift the rubber surface in many areas. When you are standing on my track, look up at my stands. Some of my concrete was put in place during the second Roosevelt administration! There are places now where you can see the metal rebar because the cement is reverting back to sand. Fixing these things will not be cheap.

I want to be here to serve our children for future generations in a manner they deserve. I ask that you consider how you want me to exist as you vote in this election.

Starting at $2.99/week.

Subscribe Today