Dear Editor:
The city leaders have failed the kids and the community. I'll be voting no on the new high school. To even debate whether there is a need for another high school is at best ignorant and at worse stupid. Of course we need another high school. It's not about increase in taxes, the kids are worth it. What we don't need is a monument built for the architects involved and the city fathers.
Gutting the existing high school is exorbitant! Once another school is built, classrooms open up and reasonable renovations to the old school, we are good to go. If the school is being used now, with just reasonable renovations, why can it not be used after the new school is completed? The plan proposed to completely gut the school to the tune of $45 million is driving a tack with a sledge hammer!
The proposed new school does not need to be a world-class campus! I could care less about landscaping and cosmetics. It's a place to learn to read and write so that you can learn science and math, period. If you want landscaping and frills, let the community or the class of 2020 donate it.
They would have passed a new school bond easily but once again, when the government was using other people's money, they went beyond reasonable. They, the government, still don't understand that you will run out of other people's money.
We need another high school. I'll be voting no on this proposed monument.