Polk County School Board hears plans for new elementary school in Winter Haven

The Polk County School Board heard plans for a new elementary school that could draw students away from their neighborhoods near the Chain of Lakes Elementary School.

During a work session Tuesday in Bartow, the Attendance Boundary Committee report was presented on the new school, entitled “New Elementary 21-C,” that would be located in Winter Haven at the corner of Old Bartow-Lake Wales Road and State Highway 653.

The cost to build the school is estimated to be between $20 million and $30 million and would be completed in 2023.

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So far, the plan is to have students in the Hart Lake Hill and Savanna Pointe subdivisions, on the opposite side of State Highway 653 from Chain of Lakes, attend the new school. The school would be about two miles away and the district is currently not obligated to provide transportation.

Students from the Terranova, Reddick’s Corner and Villamar subdivisions, located on the same side of the two-lane highway, would still attend Chain of Lakes.

School Board Member Lynn Wilson had reservations about the plans for students to walk to the new school for safety reasons and wanted alternatives to the current recommendation.

“It sounds like they are going to have them walk to the school,” Wilson said after the meeting. “That’s a concern to me, a significant concern.”

Most of the roadway does not have sidewalks except for a small length along the Lake Ashton frontage, he said. Plus, motorists going in and out of the numerous housing developments don’t stop before entering the highway.

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“I think there is a better solution and I think the superintendent is going to go back and look at another solution,” Wilson said.

The district owns real estate adjacent to Chain of Lakes, a very popular school that has been the topic of a possible expansion for years as well as potentially extending the grade levels to include eight grades. The school currently offers pre-kindergarten through 5th grade.

“They could in that process add some additional space to Chain of Lakes,” said Wilson if an expansion plan comes to fruition.

Overall, attendance zones are a thorny topic, he explained.

“One of the things I’ve heard routinely from virtually every part of our county – across the board, from every sector – is this frustration of kids not being able to attend a school that’s in very close proximity to their neighborhood.” Wilson said. “That’s a big problem. That’s a problem that needs to be addressed. That’s what parents want.”

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Members of the Attendance Boundary Committee, which is an advisory committee that makes recommendations to Superintendent Fredrick Heid, helped district staff compile the reports.

Heid said in the future the committee would be conducting a districtwide boundary analysis which could lead to more changes to attendance boundaries that accommodate for such factors as growth and development.

“If we are going to continue to provide adequacy of seats for our students and families, we need to evaluate two things: the need to build new space but also to evaluate what available spaces we already have,” Heid said. “We have talked about a number of schools that are not at 100% utilization and so for us it is incumbent on us to provide the best ROI (return on investment) for our stakeholders and showing that we are maximizing the occupancy of our buildings and part of that is the reevaluation with special considerations.”

A countywide desegregation plan and the school choice program were part of the factors considered by the district in the setting of attendance zones, he said.

Chain of Lakes Elementary School is well over its original capacity. The school at 7001 State Highway 653 sits on a 23-acre parcel, the staff report said. Its current student population places the school at 143% capacity with 1,037 students and changing the attendance zone would reduce capacity to 97% or 715 students.

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Growth and new housing developments along the area’s main artery are behind the plans to build more schools and add capacity for more students. Currently, Chain of Lakes has 23 portable classrooms to accommodate the school’s growing student population.

The New Elementary 21-C would be located at 0 Old Bartow Lake Wales Road on 39 acres in Winter Haventhe report said. The new school is expected to hold 996 students.

Students currently attending Chain of Lakes would not have to transfer once the new school is open.

Polk County property records show the district bought the land for $2.4 million in 2017 from Winter Haven-based Bentley Investment Group LLC.

Nearly a year ago in this fast-growing area of the county, the school district talked about closing Alturas Elementary School, a more than 100-year-old school considered to have antiquated infrastructure, including the use of well water. The plans were to close the school on 4th Street to tear down and reconstruct a more modern building.

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If the school had closed, the district wanted to bus students across State Road 60 in the Winter Haven area to a newer school but those plans never materialized. In the end, the community objected and persuaded the district to keep the historic building and look elsewhere to build.

In the committee’s guidelines, its members must consider keeping student bus commutes to a minimum, capacity and enrollments, growth patterns and the socioeconomic diversity of the student body at schools, among many others, in deciding where to draw the lines.

The school board also heard on Tuesday about the ABC's recommendations for the expansion of Bella Citta Elementary for a middle school and McLaughlin Middle School’s high school addition, which would lower capacity at Bartow, Frostproof and Winter Haven high schools.

Paul Nutcher can be reached at pnutcher@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on The Ledger: Polk School Board hears plans for new Winter Haven school