A community committee has just wrapped up ten months of work on anticipating the Enumclaw School District’s needs in the next 20 years and how the district should address them.

The 21-person Facility Oversight for Capital Utilization and Sustainability (FOCUS) Committee formed last February in part as a response to two failed bonds to build new school facilities and criticism that ESD was out of touch with the community.

In an email interview, FOCUS Committee Chair Anthony Wright said that it’s important to understand that this work was a community effort to ask the district hard questions.

“I think everyone went into the meetings with a questioning attitude, wanting to learn more, ask more questions, get more transparency, and answer the ‘why’ questions (why approach things this way, why make these decisions, why can you not do this),” he said. “I think the community should feel good about having representatives conducting active discussions and debates centered around the charge of the committee. Doing the research and asking difficult questions led to options, which focused on choosing and prioritizing. I think much understanding was gained about how a school district as a form of government works, including limitations.”

The final report touches on everything from student growth, aging facilities, security concerns, and perhaps most importantly, financing.

The FOCUS Committee has no ability to make decisions for the Enumclaw School District Board, and can only recommend strategies.

STUDENT GROWTH

While student growth will continue to stretch the district’s population limits, especially for its elementary school facilities, ESD has said that its projections from a decade ago have not been realized.

According to the FOCUS report, the district is now expected to grow nearly 37% in the next ten years, from 4,225 students (reported in November 2023) to nearly 5,800.

Much of this growth is expected to come from the Ten Trails neighborhood in Black Diamond; for every 100 single-family homes built, the FOCUS Committee estimates about 40 students would join the district, and there are more than 2,000 units still planned to be built.

FACILITY NEEDS

The district has stressed in the last several years the need for new elementary school facilities. This especially includes replacing the 70 year-old Byron Kibler Elementary, which hasn’t received any major upgrades in decades, and the J. J. Smith, which is as old and in similar condition.

But these plans also included a new Black Diamond-area school, as the current one is at capacity and about 100 students are being bused out to other facilities.

When it comes to the Enumclaw schools, the FOCUS Committee is recommending combining several elementary schools into one building.

“While small neighborhood schools have traditionally been the norm, they no longer provide a cost-effective option for the community,” the report reads, adding that a combined facility would “allow for better use of resources, enhanced support for specialized programs, and the capacity to accommodate future growth.”

The committee specifically recommends combining Byron Kibler and Southwood Elementary, plus the Birth to Five Center (which is currently located in J. J. Smith), into a new building.

But larger schools aren’t the only facility needs, but there are also ongoing maintenance and security upgrades as well.

As to the former, the FOCUS Committee reviewed a 2018 facility needs report written by McKinstry, which was also used as a basis for ESD’s failed bonds.

The McKinstry report found that Byron Kibler, Southwood Elementary, and the district’s transportation building received the lowest scores based on their architectural systems and mechanical, electrical, and plumbing equipment (each building was rated on a 1 to 5 scale, 1 representing the best overall condition; these three facilities all scored over a 3.5).

Repairing these three buildings based on McKinstry’s recommendations came out to an estimated $5.85 million over five years.

FUNDING

Of course, everything comes back to money — and where to get it.

Despite the widespread community dislike of last year’s failed bonds, and even criticism from members of the FOCUS Committee prior to the committee’s formation, the group recommends the district put another bond to voters to build the new school, though the measure shouldn’t be put on a ballot before spring 2026.

Wright said that he hopes the Enumclaw School District community will recognize that this recommendation isn’t coming from the district, but a group of local residents.

“[The district] didn’t try to influence the group’s decision-making in any way. They constantly reinforced that they wanted the consensus to come from the FOCUS committee. Their goal was to build trust and to ensure that the community volunteers were being heard and, ultimately, a committee recommendation, not a district recommendation,” Wright said. “… The committee advocated for the school district to focus on maintaining and caring for what we have [w]hile acknowledging that some buildings are so bad that consolidating and replacing them would be cheaper in the long run.”

The report did not make any recommendation as to what specific construction the bond should cover (like a new Black Diamond Elementary, a new Byron Kibler Elementary, both, or something else) but did recommend ESD put together a more robust community engagement outreach effort.

But the committee also recommended the district research other possible funding opportunities for these large projects.

This includes land or building sales.

For example, selling Byron Kibler and J. J. Smith could help fund a new elementary school.

Additionally, there’s land that the school district controls in the Black Diamond Ten Trails neighborhood, as per an agreement between the developer and ESD, but it is not yet being utilized.

A new high school was expected to be built on one of those plots of land, but growth projections currently don’t see Enumclaw High School reaching capacity in at least the next ten years. Selling this land to Oakpointe could also be a way to fund a new elementary school in the area.

But that’s all in the long-term, as there are current needs the FOCUS Committee feels should be addressed in the near future, like those from the McKinstry report.

The committee recommends ESD put forth a new capital projects levy in order to fund those projects until a new bond could be passed. The district has not put a capital projects levy measure to voters since at least 2006 (maintenance and operations levies only cover day-to-day costs and supplies, not capital projects).

OTHER RECOMMENDATIONS

Numerous other recommendations were made — some that have been oft discussed, and others that are new.

Perhaps the most interesting recommendation is that ESD should explore ways to modify its boundary lines and perhaps transfer the Black Diamond area to another district.

This process can be kicked off by a citizen initiative or by the ESD Board of Directors.

Other suggestions included entering into negotiations with the city of Enumclaw to buy the Pete’s Pool football field and the fieldhouse; partner with the city of Enumclaw to build a new performing arts center on district property to serve as a community center; and prioritizing Title IX compliance, specifically to repair the girls’ fast pitch field, which in recent seasons has been mostly flooded and unable to be used.