Ballots will be mailed Thursday for Marion School’s $2.2 million bond election.

Voters in the Marion School District must decide whether they will support the request, which will pay for an 11,955-square-foot expansion. Ballots must be returned to the school by Jan. 25.

If voters approve the request, property taxes on a home with an assessed value of $100,000 would increase by about $48 a year. Annual taxes on a home with a $150,000 assessed value would go up by about $72.

For that price, Marion School and its approximately 120 students would get five new classroom spaces that will be used for fourth- through eighth-graders. New rooms and a waiting area for special education, Title I, counseling, psychology and speech also are included in the plan.

The school would get a new main office and a principal’s office, which would allow Principal Justin Barnes to move out of the janitor’s closet. District Clerk Rae Mitchell would move out of the closet with the hot water heater and into the former school office.

For the first time, Marion School would get restrooms that comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The federal law requires public schools to accommodate students who need handicapped-accessible facilities; so far, no Marion student has required modified restrooms, school board chairwoman Ann Glimm told the Inter Lake last fall.

But the board knows that could change in an instant. If a student who needed a modified restroom moved into the district, the school would have to build an appropriate facility, likely at great expense.

“It would be an atrocious amount of money,” Glimm said.

The plan also would remove students from the basement of the original school building, which is more than 100 years old. Title I and GEAR UP classes, as well as counseling sessions, are held in the basement, an area a state fire inspector has determined is unusable for students.

But there is no other place to put them in the school as is, Glimm explained, so as yet the district hasn’t faced fines or been ordered to fix the situation.

The inspector “realizes we don’t have any other option,” Glimm said.

School officials say the new plan would improve safety: Instead of multiple buildings with separate entrances, there would be one main building with one primary entrance. The modular building, which now houses fourth and fifth grades, likely would become a music room and be moved to the back of the gym, where it also could be used to store physical education equipment.

Current music classes are held in the gym, which already is a high-traffic area.

“It is a scheduling nightmare for our staff to find space for music, P.E. and lunch,” says a letter to the community from the school board. “We can also add that our fourth- and fifth-graders do not have access to restroom facilities unless they leave the modular and enter the main building.”

Trustees and school officials had considered asking voters for $685,000 that would have added three new classrooms and new handicapped-accessible restrooms. But last fall, the community seemed more supportive of a larger expansion, Barnes told the Inter Lake early in the school year.

“They said we might as well do it all at one time,” he said.

For additional information about the bond election or the plan, contact the school at 854-2333. A survey regarding the addition is available at www.marionschoolmt.com.

Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com.