Oconto Falls middle school annexation petition OK’d

Land for new school to move from Stiles into city
By: 
Warren Bluhm
Editor-in-chief

The Oconto Falls School District’s bond rating has been upgraded to A-plus, which likely will help keep the interest rate down as it seeks to borrow money for a new middle school, the school board was told Jan. 9.

Superintendent Dean Hess said calculations used to develop the $37.6 million referendum question that passed in November assumed that the interest rate on the bonds would be in the neighborhood of 5%. As the district moves toward locking in an interest rate and actually issuing the bonds, Hess said he expects to be able to deliver good news on a rate — perhaps closer to 4%.

The new school is expected to replace aging Washington Middle School, with completion planned for the fall of 2025.

Meanwhile, the process of annexing the property into the city of Oconto Falls officially began this week with the school board’s formal approval of an annexation petition. The school district purchased 102 acres in the Town of Stiles a few years ago along County Road I across from the high school as a possible middle school site.

The annexation plan was introduced in December, but before the petition could be submitted, the land description needed to be updated to reflect the school district’s sale of 10 acres to the city of Oconto Falls for a new electricity substation.

The updated petition was scheduled to go to the Oconto Falls City Council the night of Jan. 10, when City Administrator Peter Wills said the process of annexing both parcels would continue.

In response to a question from board member Jan Stranz, Wills said by law the city might have to pay the town what would be lost in property tax dollars for the next five years, but since the land is owned by the school district, it is tax-exempt anyway.

Meanwhile, the school district’s design team plans to visit three recently completed middle school projects on Jan. 25, in the Clintonville, Luxemburg-Casco and West De Pere school districts.

“All of them will give us ideas of things that they think went well in their process, as well as any lessons learned,” Hess said.

Administrators are working with consulting firm Nexus Solutions to develop a page at ofpanthers.com that can update the community on the progress of the middle school project, similar to the information page that was posted for the referendum.