Impassioned discussion surrounded a split Arlington School Board vote on Thursday to approve a $570 million Capital Improvement Plan for the next decade.
At issue in the 3-2 vote on the 2025-2034 CIP were disagreements over Arlington Public Schools debt service as well as a plan to relocate the Montessori Public School of Arlington (MPSA) to the current Career Center building.
Board members Miranda Turner and Mary Kadera cast dissenting votes. Other critics of the CIP include the Arlington County Council of PTAs, the current chair of the Joint Facilities Advisory Commission (JFAC), several former chairs of JFAC and four former chairs of the Facility Advisory Committee to the School Board.
School Board Chair Cristina Diaz-Torres defended the plan, which includes $302 million for long-range renovations, $120 million for major infrastructure projects, $73 million for construction of the Grace Hopper Center and $45 million for relocating MPSA. However, she reiterated concerns that APS lacks sufficient funding to meet community needs.
“Over the next few fiscal years, we are facing a deficit of tens of millions of dollars, and that deficit is a result of a very, very simple math equation,” Diaz-Torres said. “The cost of education in the 21st century, specifically post-pandemic, is greater than… the revenue that we have available to us.”
MPSA relocation
A key point of contention in CIP discussions was the cost and necessity of renovating the legacy Career Center at 816 S. Walter Reed Drive to house MPSA.
Superintendent Francisco Durán argued in a presentation that “there isn’t a viable alternative” to the $45 million project, which is slated to move the aging elementary school facility across the parking lot from its current location.
“If we were not to move forward with this, we would have to make some very, very big decisions,” he said.
Critics have pointed to APS data indicating a projected increase in available seats within the school system over the next few years.
“There is now (something we never would have believed 6 years ago) a projected surplus of seats at every school level for the next ten years,” JFAC wrote in a June 2 letter. “Data from this year’s student enrollment projections shows that in the next five years, in SY2028-29, that APS will have a total PreK-12 surplus of 2,492 seats with a notable 1,316 surplus seats at the elementary school (ES) level.”
In light of this, the commission recommended “maintaining existing assets” and taking “a measured fiscal approach that is mindful of impacts of debt service on operating budget, maintains financial flexibility and is responsible to new developments, realities and/or changes.”
Current and former JFAC chairs, alongside several former chairs of the FAC, made sharper arguments in a letter to the School Board last week.
“Simply put, we ask you to look at non-capital solutions to address relocation of programs and seat needs,” they wrote. “In a year of tight budgets, a surplus of elementary school seats in the school system, and a year where we raised taxes to fully fund the APS budget, to focus solely on capital solutions as the School Board has done is fiscally irresponsible.”
Durán, however, noted that empty seats are not evenly distributed across all schools. He argued that having MPSA students go to other schools could lead to overcrowding in South Arlington, would require major changes in schools throughout the county and could lead to more South Arlington students having to attend school away from their neighborhoods.
“This recommendation… came to fruition not from my own thinking solely, even though it is the superintendent recommendation,” Durán said. “It came from many years of engagement, many years of conversation and much thought and processes going into what would be the best viable option and path forward for this site, for our South Arlington community overall.”
Durán did not present specific alternatives to the current relocation plan. However, Board member Bethany Zecher Sutton raised numerous issues with the possibility of closing a neighborhood school to make room MPSA, which is an option school.
“Closing a facility is complicated and extraordinarily difficult for the building leadership, the teachers and staff, families and community members,” she said. “It is a not a decision that we should take lightly, nor is it one that we should engage in as a quick fix. If it were to happen, it should be thoughtful, deliberate, respectful and collaborative.”
Financial concerns
Another topic of debate was a potential cap on the amount of debt that APS could accrue in future years.
Turner proposed an amendment to the CIP that, starting in Fiscal Year 2027, would require APS staff to attempt to manage bond issuances so that increases to debt service would average no greater than 1% year over year, unless approved by the School Board.
“The amendment is not perfect, but it does attempt to improve some of the problems,” Turner said. “It would provide a prudential lower limit on increasing debt service.”
The School Board voted against the amendment 3-2.
The CCPTA has also raised concerns about Arlington’s financial plan for the next several years. Based on an APS Facilities Condition Assessment, the association argued in a letter to the School Board that the CIP falls some $323 million short of meeting projected expenses across 39 APS buildings.
Diaz-Torres fired back against what she characterized as excessive attempts to curb APS services.
“I want to be clear that we cannot slice and dice our way to solving this problem,” she said. “If we cut as aggressively as many are proposing, we will ultimately underserve our students. We will underpay our staff, again, and we will lose the talent that we have. We will have removed the supports that we have for our classroom teachers, and we will, by accident, build a system that is designed to feed into the right-wing narrative of school privatization.”
A full APS press release on the CIP is below.
The Arlington School Board adopted the 2025-34 Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) at the Board meeting on June 20, 2024. The approved CIP totals $569.64 million for ten years, through fiscal year 2034, and funds the completion of a variety of projects started in the previous CIP, as well as new long-term facilities and infrastructure priorities.
“I want to thank the dedicated Facilities and Operations and Finance teams for developing a comprehensive CIP that provides a systematic approach and roadmap for addressing the highest priority needs of the school division,” said School Board Chair Cristina Diaz-Torres. “I appreciate the engagement of our staff and families in this process and the ongoing commitment of our community to maintaining high-quality facilities for our students.”
The approved CIP:
- Strengthens school safety by completing the remaining security vestibules and entrance renovation projects at four schools—Glebe Elementary, Oakridge Elementary, Thomas Jefferson Middle School and Claremont Immersion—by December 2024;
- Completes the renovation and modernization of kitchens at six schools—Barcroft, Drew, Barrett, Carlin Springs, Ashlawn and Science Focus—to meet current standards, by December 2026;
- Completes the modernization of the internal APS STARS Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) System, enhancing the efficiency of HR and finance services related to payroll, leave and other essential functions;
- Replaces Synthetic Turf fields at six schools and converts a Kenmore field to Synthetic Turf;
- Completes the Heights, with a Phase 2 project making the campus universally accessible for all; and
- Completes Phases 1-3 of the Grace Hopper Center Campus to include a new, universally designed facility that offers state-of-the-art spaces to support current and new program instruction, a parking structure, field and site work, by December 2027.
As part of the adopted CIP, the School Board further directed APS to prioritize ongoing renovations of existing school facilities by:
- Executing the long-range framework and data recommendations, beginning with identified infrastructure projects at five schools, including Hoffman-Boston HVAC replacement, Dorothy Hamm roof replacement, Oakridge HVAC replacement, Williamsburg roof replacement and Jamestown roof and HVAC replacement.
- Renovating the legacy Career Center building for the relocation of the Montessori Public School of Arlington (MPSA), for opening in SY 2028-29.
- Enhancing school safety by upgrading Critical Notification/Public Address Systems at 11 schools.
The School Board also moved that the Superintendent prepare for the FY 2027-36 CIP by proceeding with feasibility studies for five (5) high-priority facilities projects for Thomas Jefferson Middle School, Taylor Elementary School, Barrett Elementary School, Swanson Middle School, and Randolph Elementary, based on the Long-Range Plan to Renovate Existing Facilities’ Methodology.
This also includes work to continue the joint optimization study of the Trades Center with Arlington County, to further inform a plan for full electrification of APS school buses, APS white fleet, and County fleet, while improving site safety and efficiency of operations at this shared County and APS site.
The CIP projects will be part of the School Bond Referendum when Arlington residents vote on November 5.
View the full presentation and additional details about the process.
