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School district wants guarantee from Coral
(by Sue Hoffman - September 17, 2008)
School district wants guarantee from Coral
By SUE HOFFMAN
Solon School Superintendent Joseph V. Regano said Monday that he and the school board will want assurances that the district will not experience an increase in enrollment from the Coral Co.'s proposed lifestyle center. "We're going for a guarantee," he said.
Mr. Regano said he and the school board will be negotiating a tax-increment-financing agreement with the developer and city. The Coral Co. has proposed the $700 million, 90-acre Central Park lifestyle center east of SOM Center Road (Route 91), between Bainbridge and Solon roads.
Rezoning needed for planned-unit development will be decided by Solon voters in November. Mr. Regano said he believes it's important to have the tax-increment-financing agreement in place to give voters the information they need to make a decision. "In my mind, it has to be ready for the voters," he said.
Mr. Regano met earlier this month with Mayor Kevin C. Patton and Councilman John T. Scott about the tax-increment-financing agreement, but he has not yet met with the developer, he said. "A TIF is really between the developer and the schools."
When he addressed the school board last March, Peter L. Rubin, president and chief executive officer of the Coral Co., said he didn't anticipate families with children buying the 550 condominiums, apartments and townhouses planned for the lifestyle center. However, he told the board, "There is a certain level of uncertainty."
The Coral Co. subsequently had studies done which showed that the school district won't have a significant increase in students.
A report by Kleinhenz & Associates concluded in June: "Based on the housing types and number of units proposed for Central Park and the census data, Central Park will bring 37 to 49 new school-age children to Solon."
The district currently has 40 students living on residential streets that would be incorporated in the Central Park development, Mr. Regano said. The school district's average when there's new housing is 0.8 student per house, he said.
"If they're so sure of their figures, they're going to bear the risk, not the schools." Mr. Regano said he anticipates that families living in existing homes being purchased by the developer most likely would relocate to other houses in Solon, so any new students in the lifestyle center would be additional.
Mr. Rubin has said that the lifestyle center will produce over $2 million in income taxes a year and over $2 million a year in sanitary fees to the city. He said the schools would receive $5 million a year in taxes on a parcel that is producing less than $1 million today.
"Revenues can be severely impacted by students moving in," Mr. Regano said. Spending $11,419 per year for each student, the schools could see any extra revenue eroded quickly, he said.
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