Durham school board will take another vote on moving arts school out of downtown
The impending move of Durham School of the Arts will get another hearing Thursday, and the growing chorus of people who want to keep the arts school downtown hope they’ll be able to persuade a newly redrawn school board to press pause.
A new “state of the art” DSA was greenlit in late 2023 and is currently scheduled to open in 2026.
It would serve more students in a college campus-style design that school board members called “beautiful” and “a gateway to the future.”
But dozens of residents have spoken out against the move, citing the ballooning cost — at least $241 million — and the value of having arts students in historic downtown.
“There are many more years of useful life left in this building,” retired teacher Jayne Wheeler said during a state-mandated public hearing last week.
DSA junior Lucia Harrington said the students want to stay.
“I know our building is crumbling,” she said. “Everything can be fixed, and it can be fixed with a lot less money.”
Thursday’s meeting is still on — at least for now — despite Tropical Storm Debby’s impending arrival, a spokesperson said at noon Wednesday.
It will be at 5:30 p.m. Thursday on the district’s YouTube channel at youtube.com/@durhampublicschoolsboardof2290.
“There is expected to be a vote,” Board of Education Chair Millicent Rogers said.
The decision to move
The school’s current brick campus is on nearly 17 acres on the edge of downtown, sandwiched between North Duke and North Gregson streets with nowhere to grow. The oldest of the eight buildings was constructed in 1922.
A consultant said three years ago it was unsafe, outdated and tied up traffic at pickup and drop-off times.
Over a decade ago, the school system paid $4.1 million for the 57-acre property on Duke Homestead Road where DSA would move, land records show. The property is about 3.5 miles away, on the north side of Interstate 85.
No plans have solidified for the downtown campus, but district leaders said they will not sell the property.
The new campus will have a capacity of 2,295 middle and high school students, compared to the 1,800 served today. It’s a magnet school, with admission determined entirely by lottery.
In 2022, when voters passed a school construction bond, the new DSA was projected to use a quarter of the $425 million raised. Now, DSA will take more than half of the money — $256 million with all the upgrades under consideration — putting off renovations for several elementary schools.
Moving is likely simpler, but pricier, than a renovation, which consultants projected earlier this year would run $216 million and require shrinking the student body for several years. (Although in December, when the school board voted on the move, administration said a renovation would cost a whopping $371 million. They since had consultants produce a refined estimate.)
However, that’s not the figure being considered at the upcoming meeting.
An “apples to apples” comparison — “if we were to in essence drop the school on the DSA existing site,” as the district’s interim chief operating officer Todd LoFrese explained — suggests it would cost $56 million more to renovate.
The administration recommends continuing with the move, but Rogers said Friday she wasn’t sure how the school board was leaning.
She became the Board of Education chair this summer, when two newly elected school board members — Wendell Tabb and Joy Harrell — took office. A new superintendent will start next week.
Rogers, a DSA graduate herself, remains in favor of the move despite recent opposition, though she said she “understand(s) where the community is coming from” and will continue listening to feedback.
“The board can pivot anytime, especially if something comes up,” Rogers said.
This story was originally published August 7, 2024 at 4:49 PM.
