BCSWguru said:
I'm not well versed on it, but I see the stadiums in McKinney, Cy-Fair, Katy, etc and that seems to be the trend. Way too much. BC has a high school enrollment of 143 and they somehow have a new field, new gym, and are adding more. And they play football every Friday night, just like public schools with 8-figure stadiums. Go to any of the high dollar private schools (Episcopal, Kinkaid, St Johns) in Houston and you will see their athletic facilities are very lacking in comparison to the public schools. Its very obvious all of this excess is not needed. You cite the pool as an example, but does the school need a pool? Why cant we have a public pool the school can use just like everyone else?
I'm all for keeping facilities up. I'm tired of the excess at my growing expense.
The public pools in BCS are outdoor facilities and not very suitable for high school swimming. College Station pools in particular are only open in the summer, while the high school swim season is roughly September-February. I think Bryan High uses an outdoor public pool for part of their swim season, but I can't imagine that would work very consistently in January-February. So are you proposing to put the city taxpayers on the hook for a natatorium so the school kids can use it...?
I agree that some of the stadiums around Texas seem a bit much. Not sure how ours will stack up after renovations. I'm pretty convinced the field house upgrades that are part of the football package are needed; that seems clear enough. I also have little doubt that the AMCHS stadium in particular needs some work, but as to where $20 million will get it relative to some of those Cadillac stadiums, I frankly don't know. The cost is a fraction of what some districts are spending on new stadiums now, but it does sound like a good chunk of change.
On the other hand, the district is claiming the overall bond will lead to a $.02 cents/$100 tax increase. If you calculate the tax increase caused by just the two athletic bonds (C&D), I came to about $26/year on a $1 million home, or $12/year on a $500000 home. A tax increase is a tax increase, but that doesn't seem backbreaking. Factor in that it's pretty clear that at least a good chunk of that money is needed just to get us back to functional. I also think that if the district is going to renovations, they should do them right so they have good facilities for a good while into the future. Doing that just plain costs money. I'm OK with what they're proposing.