The building and property in the Towar Gardens neighborhood, shown here on Monday, Feb. 12, 2024, is owned by East Lansing Public Schools (ELPS) and will be torn down to construct a new central office building if the “safety, security, accessibility bond” is approved. (Julie Seraphinoff for ELi)

School Bond Will Go Before Voters in May

East Lansing residents will vote on a “safety, security, accessibility bond” on May 7, deciding whether to approve $23.5 million for “erecting, furnishing, and equipping an addition to a school building; remodeling, including security improvements to, furnishing and refurnishing, and equipping and re-equipping school buildings; erecting, furnishing and equipping a new administration building; and preparing, developing and improving sites.”

The bond was approved last week by the office of Rachael Eubanks, treasurer for the State of Michigan.

The community safety survey indicated support for the bond.

ELi spoke with Dori Leyko late last year when the bond was still in the development stages. She said the idea for a bond has existed since March 2023.

“Ever since we administered that community safety survey,” she said. “[We asked] ‘hey, if we go out for a safety and security bond in the near future, would there be support for it?’ Because we identified the need for a secure entrance at the high school for nearly a decade. I think some of what happened last winter increased the concern that we didn’t have one. Things have been OK, but we’ve had those issues of kids getting into the building. That kind of sparked the thinking about it and conversations about going out for a safety, security, accessibility bond.”

Teachers and students gathered outside East Lansing High School early on Tuesday, Jan. 24, 2023, and walked into the building together in a show of solidarity for school safety and policies following the previous night’s tense school board meeting. (Gary Caldwell for ELi)

The need for more security at East Lansing High School (ELHS) and MacDonald Middle School (MMS) was further highlighted by security assessments the district contracted through state-available grants last year. 

“There were some recommendations that were structural in those building assessments that, without a bond, we just don’t have the funds to do,” she said.

The $23 million bond will not be a tax increase.

Leyko explained the structure of the bond.

“There would not be a tax increase, so this bond would be about $23 million,” she said. “And it would be a three series bond, so we’d get the money in three consecutive years, not really equally, but as mills drop off the current tax rates, instead of it dropping off for families it would just be maintained. So we’d see a smaller amount here in ’24 if it passed in May, the bulk of it we’d see in ’25, and then we’d see some more in ’26. We looked at it, OK, if we extend it more years, could we bond more? And it wasn’t worth it to extend it. The two biggest projects would be the high school secure entrance and then the move of central office to a new space.”

East Lansing Public Schools (ELPS) Superintendent Dori Leyko during the Monday, Jan. 22, 2024, school board meeting. (Dylan Lees for ELi)

A unique space for the central office is especially important to the safety of the district, Leyko said.

“Because we’re here in the high school, we don’t have a secure entrance to our spaces,” she said. “There are a lot of meetings held in the board office and a lot of open meetings that are open to the public that mean we have folks who, whenever they want to attend those meetings, they come in the building and walk through the halls with our kids, which is probably not best practice, to have the building open and, again, we don’t have a ton of people attend those committee meetings, but anyone can. 

“The other piece, I think we really learned as an outcome of the Okemos swatting incident is, if your high school is on lockdown and we’re all in here, all of central office, that also means that if we’re on lockdown, we’re not really available and accessible to be at a command post with first responders, making decisions, communicating, etc.,” Leyko said. “So with those two pieces, along with the fact that the high school enrollment has grown a little bit over the last few years and we’ve taken some of their spots.

“This, originally, was only going to be a temporary location for central office because we were going to move into the Red Cedar [Elementary School] building when the board closed it back in spring of ’14.”

The space currently being eyed has sat unused for several years.

Another angle of the building owned by the East Lansing Public Schools (ELPS) in the Towar Gardens neighborhood on Monday, Feb. 12, 2024. (Julie Seraphinoff for ELi)

“We’re just kind of bursting here at the high school with non-high school departments that are here at the high school claiming space,” Leyko said. “We have this little space over in the Towar neighborhood, this little plot of six lots, and a building that’s nothing less than an eyesore. So, we’ve started to look at possibilities to accomplish some of these goals with a transition from being here to being at a new central office location, especially with meetings and trainings. If we can hold those off-site [and] not where we have 1,300 kids, I think we’d be able to have a more secure building.”

The building between Towar and Rutherford avenues in the Toward Gardens neighborhood will be torn down, Leyko said.

The property and building owned by the East Lansing Public Schools (ELPS) has served a variety of roles through the years. (Google Maps)

The district has worked with Kingscott Associates, the original designers of the high school, to plan security upgrades. 

“When we designed [the] elementary buildings,” she said, “it was in the wake of Parkland. There was high interest and concern around school safety, so we built in a lot of safety features. But right now at the middle and high school, if teachers want to lock their doors for a lockdown, they have to take a key and get outside in the hallway to lock their doors, which we know is not ideal.”

Leyko also said accessibility will also be addressed, saying when elevators in the high school and middle school go down, there is no way to move between floors. Architects are looking at where interior ramps can be placed.

The bond proposal has the support of the teachers union.

Mark Pontoni, high school teacher and president of the East Lansing Education Association, said his union members are in support of the bond.

“We [the union executive board] did pass a motion to strongly endorse the bond proposal as it stands,” he said.

Pontoni said the union has agreed to speak publicly to support the bond.

 “We’re ready to do that,” he said. “They’re going to include us in some of the planning, which is something we want. Teachers are generally very supportive of more security.”

Chris Martin, president of the East Lansing School Board, also spoke with ELi about his support of the bond as a parent in the district.

“I support the bond because it will give us an opportunity to make significant security and accessibility improvements to East Lansing High School and MacDonald Middle School,” Martin said in a text to ELi. “It is important to point out that the district has structured the millage in a manner that will not result in an increase in the current tax rates for East Lansing taxpayers.”

The 2017 bond for the new construction was narrowly passed, facing some community opposition.

“It only passed by about 45 votes,” Leyko said.

The Monday (Feb. 12) school board agenda included discussion of the next steps of the bond. ELi will provide a report of that meeting in the coming days.