The Coeur d’Alene School District Board of Trustees met Monday night to further discuss options for how to use the old Hayden Lake Elementary School. No actions were taken, but the group unanimously agreed the building should be opened as an elementary school.

The board came to that conclusion after spending the first part of the meeting debating whether or not the board had already agreed to open the Hayden Lake site as a school. The general consensus was that the board had, but no official decision had been made by the board to do so.

Many board members were surprised when Superintendent Matt Handelman laid out options for the school, such as turning it into a new district office or using it as an alternative middle school or kindercenter — which came lowly recommended.

Board chair Casey Morrisroe made it very clear he did not support a magnet school at the Hayden Lake site.

Trustee Christa Hazel mentioned the magnet school proposals didn’t necessarily have to be implemented at a magnet school.

“It doesn’t have to be either-or,” she said. “... we can use these programs in a neighborhood school.”

Turning the Hayden Lake site into a neighborhood school would mean adjusting attendance zones, whereas making it a magnet school would mean there would be no attendance zone.

Board members tossed around the pros and cons of opening a magnet school. The pros included providing a great education for kids, pulling kids from all over the district and the fact that other magnet schools in the district have seen success.

The cons were that magnet schools often exclude lower-income families and the district won’t know how many students it will attract until it opens. The purpose of opening a new school would be to help mitigate the district’s growing population. A magnet school would be concerning if the district can’t know how many students will attend.

One major point of concern for the board was that there wasn’t much community input on the issue. The administrative committee, separate from the Long Range planning Committee, that looked into options for the Hayden Lake site was composed of district administration and school board members.

There was, however, a survey that went out in late June asking for feedback on the magnet school proposals, but not about other options for use of the building and property.

“I’m disappointed there wasn’t as much community participation in the committee,” Hazel said.

“I want to cast our nets wider in getting feedback for what to do with the Hayden school,” Trustee Dave Eubanks added.

There was also concern of how much work and time people have put into the magnet school proposals. The board didn’t want to put those committees through so much work and end up disregarding them.

Two motions were made, one to use the Hayden Lake site as a neighborhood school and the other to implement one of the magnet proposals at the Hayden Lake site, but both were denied for lack of a second.

Ultimately, the board ended the meeting with the promise to figure out what additional information the board needed to make a decision and to get that information.