I have always been excessively proud to live in Washington. There are so many good things in this part of the heart of America.
We are about to finish a fantastic addition to Central Grade School with geothermal heat, and we have a great new building for District 52 that will be a source of pride. Both schools offer the great education that the locals have come to expect.
Both of those grade schools have been growing exponentially for several years, and all of those students are headed for a high school that has no room for them and will not meet their technology needs.
For years, for reasons I don’t understand, Washington Community High School has been allowed to run down.
The situation has reached the critical point. The safety and environmental changes are state-mandated, and the extra room will fill at an alarming rate.
The upgrades and additions are going to get done. There is no choice at this point whether the project gets done, but the decision before us is WHEN it will happen.
When I was a kid, and the only gym we had (currently the west gym) was too small and too outdated, Washington citizens tried to pass a bond issue for a new gym, a proposed state-of-the-art facility with all the bells and whistles.
It was turned down twice until 1962. That was the year WCHS sent a basketball team to the state finals.
The bond issue, a bare-bones version of the original plan, passed right away. But the bare-bones gym cost more than the very fancy one a couple years earlier because of the changes in the economy.
I wonder why this isn’t the very best time for us to renovate our high school, because there is a very good chance we can get a bargain on materials and labor.
Several years from now, the cost of goods and services may skyrocket. And right now the interest rates are the lowest we can hope for.
I know that times are shaky and worrisome and we are just “waiting,” but for what, we don’t know.
I will vote for the renovation and expansion referendum because I believe this IS the right time, and we need to maintain that pride in the orange and black that goes bone deep.
Nancy Pope
WCHS Class of 1962
Washington
