This month, Kalamazoo Public Schools Trustees expect to vote on whether to build a new Sol Elementary School, six years after it renovated the building that currently houses the school.
Through a Freedom of Information Act request, WMUK learned that it cost the district about $1.2 million to renovate the 1924 building in 2019. El Sol Elementary got remodeled bathrooms, new windows, a secure vestibule and other improvements, according to a bill for work at the school.
Director of Facilities Management Karen Jackson praised the project in a 2019 interview with WMUK.
“These will be a very nice addition to the building,” Jackson said at the construction site.
The renovation at El Sol was one of several construction projects KPS funded through a $96.7 million bond in 2018. In 2022, the district said it would build the new school in its current location when it proposed a $197 million bond, which voters approved.
At the KPS School Board meeting on Dec. 19, Superintendent Darrin Slade said neighborhood attendance at El Sol would not justify putting a new school there.
At that meeting, the district recommended that a new $41 million, 75,000-square-foot facility be built in the Eastside neighborhood, at the site of the former Brucker Elementary School, which closed in 1981.
KPS has not said what it will do with the El Sol building if the school moves. In an emailed statement, KPS spokeswoman Susan Coney said the district will seek public input if El Sol does move.
The next school board meeting is Thursday night. It’s not clear if KPS Trustees will vote on the El Sol plan this Thursday or later in the month.
