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Callaway Public Schools Superintendent JD Furrow was accompanied by four members of the CPS Board of Education at the Aug. 12 meeting of the Callaway Village Board. The purpose of getting on the board’s agenda, Furrow explained, was to begin a conversation with the Village pertaining to future plans for school expansion and city streets that may be impacted as a result of that proposed expansion.
Furrow began by explaining that the school district has acquired property across the street to the south of the kindergarten school building and the school board has begun discussions about future plans for that property.
“One of the scenarios we have discussed involves seeing if the city council would consider closing the street so we could build adjacent to our existing structure. There are a lot of logistical and security reasons for wanting to be able to do that,” said Furrow. “We also realize there are some municipality concerns that exist if we were to be able to do that as well. This is a first approach, because in reality, we are probably looking in the neighborhood of three to four years for us to be able to create a solid financing plan. But what you guys’ response would be could help us determine what scenarios could end up working best for us.”
The street in question is Kimball Street along the south side of the elementary school. Furrow explained that the discussion has been to possibly egress between the existing structure and the new structure, which would be built across the street.
“One of the major concerns is, we are looking at a preschool and do we want to have 3 and 4-year-olds going across the street? And do we want to have to be handling food from our cafeteria over there? There are just a lot of those kids of questions, and if there is a possibility for the street that would steer our planning for the future,” Furrow shared.
Besides the preschool Furrow cited other needs that the current building has. The preschool is currently in the elementary school setting and the 6th grade has been moved to the high school side. He said they would like to be able to move that grade back to the elementary side.
“The preschool would also help us solve some other problems that we have within our existing facility,” Furrow continued.
Those include a bigger weight room and an expanded art facility. “But we have not decided on what is the financially responsible thing to do at this point. We are just trying to get our ducks in a row so that as our financial planning comes together, we will be able to take action,” said Furrow. “The needs of a student body today are not the same as the needs of a student body in the past. We now have an in-house speech pathologist and three special education teachers; some of our staffing needs create room needs.”
Some of the Village Board members questioned why the school district is not considering building on to the east side of the existing building rather than to the south. One of the concerns that the Village Board shared is the fact that Kimball Street serves as a direct route for the ambulance to transport patients from the hospital to meet the medical helicopter, which lands on the practice field.
“Doing anything with this street (Kimball Street) is going to take a lot of consideration from this board. If you think it would work to the east I think that would be a possibility,” said Village Board Chairman Mark Kimball.
Furrow said the plan would most likely include moving the existing section of Kimball Street about a half block to the south. While there was a great deal of discussion between the two boards, there was no action to be taken at this point. School board members present for the meeting were Mike Reiff, Rhonda Pandorf, Jim Phelps, and Rebecca Eggleston.
One agenda item that did require action by the board was the consideration of applicants for the position of Village Ordinance Officer. Chairman Kimball explained that the position entails enforcing city ordinances only and does not involve abatements.
Following the discussion, the board unanimously approved hiring Alan Eastwood as the new ordinance officer. Kimball explained that Eastwood will most likely begin with enforcing ordinances pertaining to dogs, as that is one of the primary complaints from local residents.
The next meeting of the Village Board will be Sept. 9 at 7 p.m. All meetings are open to the public.
