Kalispell Public Schools has begun a conversation on facility planning that will spur conversations that may impact students for years to come.

The community was invited to attend a facility planning committee at Linderman Education Center Wednesday to get the ball rolling before meeting again in early September.

District administrators, teachers, parents, a few community members, Kalispell Mayor Mark Johnson and Kalispell Planning Director Tom Jentz attended.

Facilitating the discussion were architecture, engineering and planning firms Fanning Howey, L’Heureux Werner and Morrison-Maierle. Fanning Howey and L’Heureux Page Werner have worked on previous projects, including Browning and Glasgow high schools. L’Heureux Page Werner completed master-planning services for Great Falls High School.

Discussion ranged from maintenance on current buildings to configurations of a new school(s) on a 25-acre district-owned property south of Kalispell on Airport Road. One goal is to adapt 20th-century buildings to 21st-century learning and growing enrollment.

“This is big-picture planning,” L’Heureux said. “We have months of work to do. I think a lot of people want answers by August. We’re just starting to begin to dig in with Jason [Betterley, district facilities and transportation systems facilitator] on operation needs.”

In the early stages of planning, the goal is to ask questions and explore ideas — start big and scale down.

“Tonight is very informal. The point is to get input and for you to understand the planning process,” L’Heureux said later, adding, “This is not the end. This is the start. If you see something you question or disagree with, speak up.”

There were no cost estimates suggested by the firms. L’Heureux guaranteed that if he threw out any numbers at this point, they would be too high or too low.

Facility plans typically cover 10 years.

L’Heureux said the district has kept schools is fairly good shape compared to other districts.

“Let me give you an example. Great Falls hasn’t built a new school building in 50 years and enrollment is growing almost as rapidly as yours,” L’Heureux said. “You guys have a great start.”

As far as building a new school at the property off Airport Road, a few participants, including Kalispell Public Schools Superintendent Mark Flatau, spoke about building a facility that houses middle school grades — either kindergarten through eighth or fifth through eighth — to relieve pressure on elementary schools and Kalispell Middle School.

The Airport Road property was purchased with long-term planning in mind; it can accommodate two buildings.

There is an added benefit to a building configured to house middle school students in addition to elementary because it could bring in students from another district. The district has been in discussion with Somers-Lakeside School District about the possibility of sending Somers Middle School seventh- and eighth-graders to a new facility.

Although Somers-Lakeside School District recently passed a $185,000 per year operation and maintenance levy, it has struggled to pass previous levies and keep up with a backlog of repairs at the middle school. Flatau added that Kalispell Middle School cannot support 10 years of continued growth.

“The parcel we acquired is actually quite close to a portion of their boundary,” Flatau said. “We’d enter into some sort of agreement. We already do that with Creston. Creston is a K-6 district and they send their students to our middle school.”

Flatau said the benefit would be opening a school with roughly 200 more students, bringing in additional state funding.

Kalispell Public Schools trustee Steve Davis said he would like to see a kindergarten through 12th-grade building, but at the minimum it should be a kindergarten- through eighth-grade building.

Another idea  tossed out was building a high school at the Airport Road property and turning Flathead into an elementary/middle school. The biggest problem in building a high school is that the land was purchased with elementary district money from elementary district voter approval.

The property also is not big enough, according to Flatau and Greg Monberg of Fanning Howey. Monberg said the recommended minimum is 30 acres plus an acre for every 100 high school students.

“If you have 1,200 students you’ll need about 42 acres minimum,” Monberg said.

Building a new school will require a bond. It might be the case that other building maintenance priorities could be included. Passing a bond requires taking the pulse of community opinion, L’Heureux said.

“Helena just tried to put out a bond issue and it just got beat down bad,” L’Heureux said. “We’re still trying to figure out why, but I don’t think they really understood the pulse of their community.”

Flatau said by the time the planning process is complete there should be a needs list for each building established, with input from the community and a price tag with accurate estimates.

Flatau said a big challenge is ahead for the facility planning work group.

“I’m convinced we’ll convince folks to support this plan. There’s no doubt in my mind we will do that,” he said.

For more information about the facility planning committee, call 751-3400.

Reporter Hilary Matheson may be reached at 758-4431 or by email at hmatheson@dailyinterlake.com.