Fieldcrest should repair instead of rebuilding

January 18, 2015

Editor: Dave Uphoff

At the next Fieldcrest Board of Education meeting on January 28th, there will be a discussion of the building issues facing the school district. At the last meeting Superintendent Dan Oakley said there are many repairs that need to be done to bring the buildings up to code. The prevailing attitude at the meeting seemed to indicate that constructing a new building was more cost effective than repairing the existing structures. How that conclusion came about or what studies were done to reach that conclusion is unknown to the public.

The two buildings mentioned that were in most need of repair are the Wenona middle school and the Fieldcrest High School in Minonk. It is obvious that new wiring, plumbing and heating/air-conditioning need to be upgraded. The question is which is more cost effective - new construction or repairing the existing structures.

The Fieldcrest High School building was constructed in 1938 with materials that would probably not be used to day because of cost concerns. The floors are irreplaceable and the building appears to be solid. The district could not afford to build a building like that today. It is a great building that should be preserved.

Adding new wiring, plumbing and heating to an existing building is standard work. Solar panels can be put on an old building as easily as a new one. There are many other buildings in Minonk that are much older, such as our churches, that are functioning properly and do not need to be torn down. Most of buildings at the University of Illinois are over 70 years old and are still in good use. Thirty years ago the high school gymnasium was condemned which led to the construction of a new gym. Today the old gym is still standing and being used and is none the less for wear. It is hard to imagine that it is cheaper to tear down and rebuild than to upgrade existing buildings that are in reasonable shape. If it was, every building in Minonk would be rebuilt every 50 years.

Already the City of Wenona and the City of Minonk are preparing to get involved in this process. Rumors have been floating around for years about building a new school that would house grades 5 to 12. This would be a costly project that this district simply cannot afford. Fieldcrest already has a relatively new gymnasium and an athletic field and it would very costly to build new ones. We are not a rich district and are already paying high property taxes.

There does not appear to be any local support for building a new school. With the State of Illinois nearly bankrupt schools will have to learn to live within a budget just like everyone else. Taxpayers want accountability. Our schools need to emphasize cost containment and run the school like a business. The school spent $40,000 purchasing the former Presbyterian Church and today all it is used for is to store junk. Where did all this stuff come from and why was it bought in the first place? At Fieldcrest South some of the old classrooms are used for storage. Did we need to build a new addition just so there was more space to store stuff?

The Fieldcrest school district is not going to grow very much and the district does not need more classroom space. The only way schools in the future can survive economically is to gradually convert over to online schooling which will reduce the need for personnel, infrastructure and transportation. Studies indicate that online courses are more effective and provide a broader range of courses.

Instead of resorting to the typical American tear-it-down and rebuild mentality, the Fieldcrest Board of Education now has a chance to be really innovative. Fieldcrest can lead the way into the future by planning to convert to online schooling for the upper grades. Whether we like it or not, that is the future and new buildings do not figure into that equation. The Fieldcrest schools should be repaired, not torn down and rebuilt.

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