Light at the End of the Tunnel, Fine Arts Center may have second chance

New school board member Rodolfo Lopez raised the issue of the Student Activity Center again at Wednesday’s board meeting. Lopez, who now sits as board president after debunking Lupita Fuentes, made a passionate plea to the board to give the tax payer what was promised to them. Melodramatics aside, Lopez was referring to the fine arts center that was originally planned when the SAC blueprints were made public. The FA center however, was one of the first projects that had to be amended due to budgetary shortfalls, many of those unavoidable, according to sources within the district. After all was said and done, the FA center would be allocated 2 million dollars to complete, this would be several million dollars short of what it would take to construct the fully functioning FA center that was promised two years ago.



The tax payers quickly caught wind of the project slashing and public discontent with the omission of the FA center may have played a key role in the May 9th elections. This however may not be the last chapter in the FA center saga. Wednesday’s meeting gave way to renewed hope for the center after it was informed that the district will tap the special projects funds to complete the fine arts center. In a conversation with Superintendent Sanchez, he informed us that an additional two million dollars may be allocated to the project. These two million dollars along with the original 2 million should be enough to complete the project according to Sanchez. The special projects budget originally counted with about seven million dollars which were intended to finish the Rosita Valley structures that were destroyed by the tornado in 2007. Due to added contributions from the district’s insurance company for the total loss of the tornado affected areas, the district had reserves to direct to the project. The superintendent has given the school architect the green light to present the fine arts project to the board at the next meeting and remains confident that the project will be close to what was promised to the public.