The Hudson School District is taking another look at turning the St. Croix Meadows dog track into a high school.
The Hudson school board and city council met Monday night to discuss a proposal that has seen changes since a council vote blocked the district from buying the property in 2012.
The new proposal, which school board president Jamie Johnson said is not a final plan, would involve the district leaving 33 acres of the long-vacant St. Croix Meadows Greyhound Racing Park open for development.
The district previously proposed buying the entire 130 acres and offering 10 acres for development or city use.
“We’ve progressed to an idea that’s more of a balanced approach, more of a multi-use concept,” said Johnson in a presentation to the council.
District voters approved the purchase of the entire site for $8.25 million in 2012. The purchase was contingent, however, on the property being rezoned from commercial to public use. However, the rezoning was denied by the city council that September.
Some city council members at the time noted that a major sticking point with the plan was a loss of tax revenue, both real and potential, from eliminating the land from potential development and taking it off the tax rolls.
The district does not have a new agreement with the dog track’s ownership to purchase the site, but it has been in discussion with an agent over a possible sale, said school board member Brian Bell. The reduced acreage could go for an estimated $4.6 million, Bell said, a reduction in per-acre cost over the previous purchase agreement.
There would be some costs involved, including demolition and improvements, that bring the district’s estimate for the total land cost to about $5.5 million to $6.1 million. An existing building on the site and other infrastructure could make for estimated cost savings of about $4.5 million to $6.8 million.
The plan would call for a new three-year high school on the site, the current high school being converted to a school for the eighth and ninth grades, and the current middle school being converted to a school for the sixth and seventh grades.
It also would require that a portion of the dog track land previously surveyed as wetlands become developable land — something that would require further review, Bell said.
He suggested a school on the property, and the increased traffic to area, could make the remaining commercial land more attractive to developers.
The land has been vacant since 2001.
Not everyone was on board with the plan during Monday’s meeting.
School board member Sandy Gehrke has spoken in the past about her disapproval of the district’s plan to buy the dog track and she reiterated her position, saying the district should be looking to expand the current high school to meet space needs.
Some members of the city council had questions about the plan, and Mayor Alan Burchill said more information is needed about the 33 acres of commercial land that would remain.
Johnson said the district has an obligation to the taxpayers to seek the most cost-effective plan for a new school, “and that’s why we’re back here.”
“We’re bringing it to the front burner,” Johnson said of the dog track plan. “But whether it’s going to stay there is really up the city.”
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