The Wake County (N.C.) school board has approved a $1.98 billion school construction program that would cover most of the growing district’s facility needs to 2023.
The Raleigh News & Observer reports that the district's building program calls for 14 new schools and 11 major school renovations.
“This is a long-term plan that will continually be updated,” says school board member Jim Martin. “This is the kind of wise planning that we need going forward.”
The school board has asked Wake County commissioners to provide the necessary funding for future school construction.
The projects would be funded over multiple years so the public wouldn’t be asked to approve a nearly $2 billion bond referendum in one vote. Commissioners are considering whether they should wait until 2018 to put a school construction bond referendum on the ballot instead of November 2016.
The plan envisions construction of 10 new elementary schools, two middle schools and two high schools. Many of those schools would be built near the current and future route of Interstate 540.
