South Bend school board votes down career center proposal
Subscriber Benefit
As a subscriber you can listen to articles at work, in the car, or while you work out. Subscribe Now
Plans for a career center in St. Joseph County will not move forward after the South Bend school board voted against turning an elementary school on the west side of the city into a hub for career and technical education classes.
The proposal by the South Bend Community School Corp. to spend over $10 million and reconfigure Coquillard Elementary School into a career center was the latest attempt at getting a designated space for career-focused courses off the ground after the district promised such a building in 2020 as part of passing a $220 million property tax referendum.
The board’s vote means St. Joseph County will be the largest county in the state to be without a specialized career center for the foreseeable future.
The board voted 4-3 against renovating Coquillard, with longtime career center skeptics Jeannette McCullough and Mark Costello joining board president Stuart Greene and Stephanie Ball in voting “no.”
“I still l am concerned partly about the process—we could have done some things better—we looked at many, many sites,” Greene said before the board’s vote. “Some things have fallen apart and not by our own making. … When someone takes a lease agreement and pulls it out from under us, that’s not self-inflicted.”
Since 2020, the district has considered multiple different sites for the career center. This summer, the district was on the verge of signing a lease for a 53,000 square feet space in the Studebaker Building near downtown South Bend. The district had budgeted nearly $13 million and was set to sign a 20-year lease.
READ MORE: What’s next for South Bend Schools’ proposed career center?
But the district and the building’s owner, Kevin Smith, couldn’t hammer out a final lease over disagreements about who would be responsible for specific renovation work, leaving the district searching for new options yet again.
The district then turned to Coquillard, an elementary school on the west side of South Bend. District leaders say Coquillard’s location is beneficial since it is nearer to development in New Carlisle where Amazon Web Services and General Motors are building multibillion-dollar facilities.
Board members who voted against the plan cited concerns about the impact of moving students from Coquillard to a neighboring school. Some blamed the rushed process by the district to try and get the measure approved.
Jeff Rea, president and CEO of South Bend Regional Chamber of Commerce and has been involved in planning for the career center, spoke to Inside INdiana Business before Monday’s vote. He said the business community was beginning to show frustration at the district’s inability to even pick a location for the center.
“I think it’s at a pretty critical sink or swim spot and I think the business community is going to lose patience with the process if we have to start over again early next year,” Rea said.
Whether the district makes another push to renovating Coquillard for the career center is unclear. The board’s next scheduled meeting is Jan. 8, when three new board members will be sworn in.