Guest Opinion: Investing Pleasanton Unified School District property assets for the future of our students | News

More than the past calendar year, the Pleasanton Unified Faculty District has engaged in a extensive services grasp setting up course of action to assess current property belongings and establish needs relating to getting older faculty services.

In the drop of 2021, the trustees took motion to involve a few district attributes in the city’s Housing Factor system. This motion was taken to leverage current, underutilized house property to boost current college services and be certain upcoming generations of learners have access to modern amenities in which to learn, participate in and improve.

At our ask for, the metropolis of Pleasanton incorporated the 3 attributes — district business, a vacant residence off of Vineyard Avenue, and a portion of the Donlon faculty field — in the city’s Housing Component Strategy previously this yr. We engaged with various neighborhood companions all around each and every of the three properties and gained practical enter.

Very last 7 days, Superintendent David Haglund requested that a single of these qualities, the subject adjacent to Donlon Elementary College, be eliminated from the city’s Housing Element program.

By preserving the part of Donlon discipline, we hope to make a different kind of investment decision in the school and the bordering neighborhood.

To that close, PUSD appears to be forward to ongoing discussions with the city to establish consensus about a system that would reward each the university and neighborhood. This could include things like a joint-use agreement relating to the Donlon field that supplies for shared industry place that serves our learners and people, as perfectly as the community residents.

At our July 14 conference, the Board of Trustees accepted the acquisition of an current Hacienda Organization Park house referred to as the Arroyo Constructing. This move will permit a greater part of district business features to be centralized in a single site, and eliminate anticipated costs linked to modernization of the present-day facility.

The current district business property at 4665 Bernal Ave. is extremely beneficial offered the want for housing as effectively as its proximity to downtown and general public transportation. The 7 acres of the present house becoming deemed for sale, have been assessed by the district’s authentic estate brokers at $31 million to $34 million, when compared to the $23.5 million acquire rate of the new office place.

The proceeds of the sale of the Bernal home would not only include the price tag of paying for the new facility and any tenant enhancements the cash would also supply methods to devote in other facility (capital) improvements that would specifically profit PUSD college students.

As an additional reward, the Arroyo house hosts leased business office space, which offers an further earnings source yielding an yearly return of roughly $1 million.

As fiscal stewards for our students and the broader local community, this acquisition is an financial commitment that just helps make perception. By preserving close to 3 acres of the Bernal assets, we will pave the way for very important facility improvements at Village Large Faculty and room for the expanding Pleasanton Virtual Academy.

Village Higher Faculty college students are currently housed in buildings constructed in the 1950s on a campus with substantial safety and ADA-compliance difficulties. We can and ought to do far better for a rising population of college students that advantage from a non-common university solution.

As a group, it is essential that we arrive jointly to make certain all Pleasanton learners have access to high-top quality school services, together with innovative spaces to discover, perform, accomplish and compete.

Editor’s take note: Mark Miller is the president of the Pleasanton Unified Faculty District Board of Trustees. Miller was 1st elected to the board in 2014, is a previous PUSD mum or dad and present Pleasanton resident.