Stage is set for districts to move forward

When Coeur d’Alene School District trustees meet Jan. 22, the road leading to a new elementary school on Prairie Avenue should be smoothed out.

Good thing. There have been too many rocks and potholes already.

A key piece of the proposal that voters overwhelmingly approved in 2017 — a new elementary school in the district’s rapidly growing northwest region — has endured prolonged birthing pains.

The district quickly discovered that acquiring property would be far tougher than anticipated. With buyers actually competing for prime parcels, prices skyrocketed as inventory shrank. Speculators contributed to the anxiety by turning a challenge into a nightmare.

But district officials persevered and last May bought a functional site on the south side of Prairie Avenue west of Ramsey Road. The promise that had been made to faithful voters was on the way to fulfillment. Yet rocks that had rolled earlier — disagreement over building on existing district space east of Government Way in Hayden vs. keeping the promise of building where many new homes were going up — bounced up again and chipped the district’s windshield.

Meantime, a deal that school officials had agreed upon with Lakes Highway District for project approval suddenly appeared to be falling apart. On Dec. 6, however, Lakes Highway commissioners, by a 2-1 vote, instructed staff to draw up an agreement with the school district that would at long last set the stage for construction on the Prairie site to begin.

That’s where it stands heading toward next Tuesday’s school board meeting. But first, Lakes Highway District will meet on Monday. Having had more than a month since the Dec. 6 vote to draft a formal agreement with school district officials, LHD commissioners are poised to responsibly clear the way for groundbreaking on Prairie and allow the school district to fulfill its promise to the voters.

Maybe when the Prairie school opens in the autumn of 2020, all these rocks and potholes will have been long forgotten.