BY KARISSA MILLER
Iredell-Statesville Schools Superintendent Jeff James shared his concerns about capacity issues at several district schools with the Board of Education at Monday’s meeting.
I-SS operates 38 schools. On the first day of school, the district welcomed 20,102 students, an increase of 190 from the first day of the 2023-2024 school year. Officials expect enrollment figures to climb during the coming days.
James told the board that seven elementary schools and two high schools exceeded capacity during the 2023-2024 school year. All of the schools are located in the southern end of the county, which has experienced surging population growth in recent years.
Those elementary schools are Shepherd, Central, Troutman, East Iredell, Lakeshore, Coddle Creek and Lake Norman. The middle school is Oakwood. The high schools are South Iredell and Lake Norman.
Shepherd Elementary is operating at 112.4 percent of its capacity, making it the most overcrowded school in the district.
To relieve overcrowding in that area, the district is planning to build Weathers Creek High School in the southern end. A new elementary school is also needed, officials said.
“We need to get the new high school built because behind that we are in need of one elementary — if not two,” James said.
The superintendent said that he learned Friday that building permits for 22,000 additional homes have been approved.
“So, that’s about 6,600 students that we will be getting,” he explained.
Local jurisdictions are not allowed to levy impact fees on developers under state law.
“So developers come into our county and buy up land, especially land that has water and sewer. Then who is left building our schools?” James said. “Us.”
The Iredell County Board of Commissioners are responsible for building schools. The board has a way to pay for them, the superintendent added.
“Our property taxes have got to go up. You can fuss at the commissioners … but we have to build schools. You have a legal right for your child to attend a school in your district,” he added.
The county, James said, will need to spend about $450 million on school construction in the next four or five years to meet the district’s needs.
Is redistricting an option?
Changing the attendance boundaries and shifting students from crowded schools to others schools that have capacity is an option for alleviating crowding issues.
“If there were some schools that weren’t already full, then redistricting becomes a little easier,” James said. “The problem is they are all located in the same area.”
The superintendent said that the average time for a student on a bus ride between 45 minutes and an hour.
“If I redistrict, do you really want your child on the bus for an hour to an hour and a half?” he asked.
If officials changed the district lines now, it would disrupt the feeder pattern for students. Then, once new schools are built, the district would have to change the lines again.
That’s not the best approach, he said.
“You want to try and keep kids together for their school career,” he explained.
The preferred approach is to wait to redistrict until the new high school is built, James said.
“Special concern” status
The schools on the district’s special concern list are at 80 percent capacity or above.
James told the board that the district needs to start planning for new construction when a school’s enrollment reaches 85 percent of capacity.
The elementary schools on the special capacity list are Woodland Heights, Cloverleaf, Cool Spring, Sharon, Celeste Henkel and Third Creek.
One middle school on that list is The Brawley School.
Open Capacity Schools
The schools that have open capacity for future growth are Harmony Elementary, Lakeshore Middle, North Iredell Middle, Statesville High, West Iredell High, Troutman Middle, NB Mills Elementary, Scotts Elementary, Woodland Heights Middle, Union Grove Elementary, West Iredell Middle, Third Creek Middle and East Iredell Middle.
Although there is capacity for several schools the western part of the county, developers are planning to build 3,000 to 4,000 homes prepared in that area, James said.
Iredell-Statesville Schools Enrollment
Looks like the Commissioners have only been looking at one side of the property tax equation by approving unbridled development. It doesn’t take a rocket surgeon to see that those new citizens are going to need schools for their kids.
EDITOR: The vast majority of new housing developments in Iredell County have been approved by municipal boards — not the Iredell County Board of Commissioners.
Would swaping buildings for Third Creek Middle and Oakwood IB, be a possibility?
The impact fee law needs to be updated. If a developer is building 2000 homes or so, they need to be responsible for some costs. Come on, Sen. Sawyer and Rep. McNeely!
Email Mcneely and Sawyer. Ask them to run a bill for local option impact fees. Let us know if you get a reply
Proof positive that it is time for new leadership within the Board of Iredell County Commissioners. We need fresh eyes, ears, ideas, and perspectives. The same old, same old is not working for all of the children of the county.
So what’s the actual cost after these geniuses stall and stumble their way through construction like they’ve done with the high school?
When calculating the numbers, it seems that both redistricting AND building one new of each – elementary school, middle school, and high school would solve the problem. Currently, according to the numbers given, they balance as follows:
SCHOOL STUDENTS CAPACITY %FILLED
ELEMENTARY 8746 9891 88.42%
MIDDLE 4357 6259 69.61%
HIGH SCHOOL 6802 8096 84.02%
ALL STUDENTS 19905 24246 82.10%
In 2020 the residents of Iredell County approved a school bond proposal. Mooresville Graded Schools has built occupied their new building. Meanwhile, Iredell-Statesville Schools Board has spent the last three years calling each other names & suing each other. The current school board is dysfunctional & is not fulfilling its leadership duties.
Sadly, it’s the Statesville City Council approving developments in the county (like Briarwood/Stamey Farm) then annexing them. Even the City Planning Board voted again this development. I wish the county commissioners had a say in this.
Maybe concentrate on repairing/clean up roads for safety in these new home construction areas first. Safety for the buses/people living in the area of question. Maintaining before construction so our county looks like a nice area to live and not sharp contrast to Brawley side of Mooresville. It doesn’t have to be such a sharp divide within same county. If you are going to approve so many thousands of extra homes in the area the maintenance needs to accounted for and the ability for kids to go to district schools on bus or no bus.
If the school board and superintendent would quit dragging their feet, a new high school would already be done. Work on a new elementary could have started with the extra $120 million that they asked for to build the high school. Come on, school board. Get it together and do some work.