Making I.C. schools closure recommendation in ‘really short’ timeframe

IOWA CITY — In a little over two months, the Iowa City schools Attendance Boundary Committee will present school closure and attendance boundary scenarios to families for the 2027-28 school year.

But many committee members left their second meeting Wednesday feeling like they had more questions than answers.

“It’s frightening to go into this blind,” said Mayra Hoskyn, a school counselor at Liberty High School, a parent in the district and member of the committee.

“We do probably want to make the big decisions here, but we don’t have the facts. We don’t have the data. We don’t have what the implications are. … What if we close too many schools, and we’re too aggressive with that? What if we don’t close enough, and we have this cloud looming over us for years?” said Hoskyn, whose children attend Van Allen Elementary and North Central Middle School.

“None of us in this room want a closure of a school. … I think all of us here know it has to happen. I think we can digest this. However, it’s going to be very hard to make a decision because everybody here is invested in their own school community,” Hoskyn said.

The 50-member ad hoc Attendance Boundary Committee has been tasked with shaping a decision to close schools and redraw attendance boundaries as part of the district’s $32.5 million in budget reductions over the next four years. The district is aiming to reduce costs by $13.8 million next year alone.

The cuts are based on a projection of a 1% annual increase to per-pupil state aid — the baseline dollar amount the state allocates to public K-12 school districts — in the next four fiscal years and a sharp decline in projected enrollment.

District leaders also are planning to reduce expenses by examining programs, staffing and operations.

Public input

The Iowa City district will hold three public input nights on Jan. 19, 20 and 21, to gather feedback on school closure and attendance boundary scenarios.

The school board will consider the boundary committee’s recommendation for building and boundary adjustments Feb. 23.

“We’ve acknowledged from the start of this process that this timeline is really short,” interim Superintendent Amy Kortemeyer told the committee Wednesday. “We’ve got a mountain of work to do in a very short amount of time.”

“We feel strongly about having a decision in March ahead of spring break because of needing to turn our attention then to communication, working with our staff, our families and giving everybody the care they deserve,” Kortemeyer said.

‘Uncharted territory’

The Iowa City district is facing financial uncertainty after failing to accurately track spending and revenue for nearly three years under the leadership of former Superintendent Matt Degner, former Deputy Superintendent Chace Ramey, former Chief Financial Officer Adam Kurth and former Chief Human Resources Officer Nick Proud.

Kortemeyer began the committee meeting Wednesday with an apology.

“The financial position we’re finding ourselves in is certainly uncharted territory, and some of this information has come to light even since our last boundary committee meeting,” Kortemeyer said.

Kortemeyer said the district is continue to “find information that’s not favorable,” that’s painting “the picture of the dysfunction in the business office.”

“When we talk about the need for budget reductions and embarking on the work that we’re doing, one of the huge pieces of that is we are extremely cash-strapped,” Kortemeyer said.

The district is facing declining enrollment and “underfunding” from the state, she said.

“There’s a lot of compounding factors for the need of getting after budget reductions, which seems like a very steep hill to climb,” she said.

Enrollment, building capacity

The meeting Wednesday was led by district administrators Kortemeyer, Chief Operating Officer Curt Pratt and Chief Financial Officer Pat Moore. The meeting was added to the committee’s schedule after committee members asked for additional information and time.

The committee took a look at the district’s revenue and expenses, projected enrollment and building capacity.

The district is contracting with RSP & Associates — a leader in school planning that has worked with dozens of Iowa school districts to analyze enrollment trends and attendance boundaries, so leaders can make data-driven decisions.

RSP projects the district’s enrollment to decline by almost 5 percent over the next five years to about 14,100 students.

Pratt said Wednesday the district is down 289 students this year, which means about $2.5 million less in per- pupil state funding.

A lot of the enrollment decline can be attributed to lower birth rates, with the district graduating more students from high school than it has incoming kindergartners, Pratt said.

This decline will result in about 8,000 open “seats” in the district and utilization of schools at just over 60 percent by the 2030-31 school year if nothing changes.

Improving facility use — or closing schools — could help the district improve operational efficiency and better align resources with student needs.

School principals at the meeting Wednesday said they support the building capacity numbers calculated by Pratt.

Wickham Elementary School Principal Heather Stevens said when she first saw the school’s capacity numbers, she thought “there’s no way.”

Stevens said she went through her building counting every full-size classroom, leaving two classrooms open for English language learners and special education programming.

“I do trust these numbers,” she said.

Next meeting

RSP’s CEO Rob Schwarz led the committee’s first meeting last month, but committee members said the “tone” of the meeting was wrong.

“A lot of us left with a very bad taste in our mouth,” committee member Brett Watson said at the Wednesday meeting.

“The tone of the meeting was confrontational, almost upbeat knowing this is an extremely horrible situation,” Watson said. “None of us want to be here. This is the last thing we wanted to do. This is serious. We’re here for serious business.”

The Attendance Boundary Committee’s next meeting will be Nov. 19, at the Educational Services Center, 2255 N. Dubuque Road, Iowa City. The meeting is open to the public.