Council Bluffs School District ponders fate of Madison Campus property | Education

“If it’s extended, we would look at trying to buy that down further,” she said.

The Iowa House overwhelmingly approved a bill during its 2018 session to extend the SAVE tax through 2049, but the Senate’s version of the bill never made it to the floor. A bill designating 30% of the SAVE revenue to property tax relief passed in 2019.

Now, both middle school projects have been completed, and the district is trying to decide whether to have additional remodeling done on the facility to make it suitable for other purposes or to sell it and use the money for construction of the district’s new Early Learning Center or other needs.

The district distributed a ThoughtExchange survey to staff and families Wednesday to collect feedback on what should be done with the property.

• The district could remodel the building and move its central offices to that location instead of continuing to pay to lease space in the Omni Centre Business Park and using some of the space for professional development, copying and a mailroom. Converting the facility for this purpose would cost $4 million to $5 million, according to information in the survey. In addition, the building is expected to need a new roof within 10 years, it stated. This would not use all of the building’s 95,000 square feet of space.

Several other ideas surfaced in responses to the ThoughtExchange, which had been completed by 430 people as of midday on Thursday.