Board votes to construct district stadium
Wednesday, March 17, 2010
All six members of the Eudora Board of Education voted last night to proceed with construction of a new district stadium, the final facility voters approved in the November 2007 bond. The stadium will be built in the field west of Eudora High School to accommodate the soccer, football and track teams, as well as marching band and physical education classes. Click here to see a virtual tour of the future facility.
ATG Sports, an Andover, Kan.-based firm, will design and build the stadium at a cost not to exceed $1,888,418, approximately $1.1 million less than the district had originally budgeted in the bond.
"The board has spent a great deal of time and energy, making certain that this was the right thing for our district," said Superintendent of Schools Don Grosdidier.
The decision was complicated by the fact that the original bond budget came up short, due to many unexpected factors. The bond budget shortfall resulted from overruns at the elementary school and a variety of economic factors, ranging from unprecedented conditions in the bond market to lower-than-projected assessed valuation.
Because completion of the stadium will push the bond package over the $45 million bond by approximately $600,000, completing the project will require additional financing. With a variety of funding options, the board has yet to make a final decision on how this overage will be addressed. That decision will depend in part on the final costs of the current projects under construction. The new facility to house the Eudora-De Soto Technical Education Center, as well as the classroom and auditorium additions at EHS.
Grosdidier stressed that, although the original bond package and budgets were designed based on factors that dramatically changed, the board was committed to doing as much as possible to benefit students, staff and the community.
"Ultimately," he said, "we are fortunate that the projects came in this order — addressing the classroom needs of students first and leaving the stadium for the end, in case the budget came up short. The board has worked hard to deliver on as much of the voter-approved bond package as possible, and patrons have made it clear over the past several months that they expected the board to build the stadium that was approved in the bond resolution."
Laws Field, the district's existing athletics facility near 14th and Church, is owned by the district, as is the property to the north of Laws, where the former Nottingham Elementary currently sits. The construction of the new stadium will allow the board to explore options with these properties that could increase the commercial tax base and possibly generate revenue that could fund other district needs.
