At the most recent meeting of the Long Range Facilities Planning Committee, the district has hired a new Demographics organization to look at enrollment projections. The new firm (last year it was FLO Analytics) is BERK Consulting. From the presentation, they too are forecasting a declining population, especially in the number of births and the 0-5 population within the Olympia School District. That combined with some of the School Capacity numbers and one slide in particular in the presentation do give us some pause, especially after the school closures we fought against last year.
Repurposing a building if it drops below 90% capacity seems contradictory to the threshold percentages that were put forth last year at the April 25, 2024 board meeting.
From the 4/25/2024 board meeting:
In addition, it seems shortsighted to include portables in the utilization rate as they are intended to be a temporary measure for when a building is over capacity and could be removed. Taking that into account, using the numbers presented at the last CAC meeting, our building utilization percentage would look like the following, meaning that NO school closures SHOULD be being discussed at the meeting, but we have been surprised before.
| School | Class Rooms & Instructional Spaces | Planning Capacity (class size 25) | Portable Capacity included | 2024-2025 FTE (Annual Average through March | Current available Capacity (incl Portables) | Building Utilization % with Portables | Building Utilization % w/o Portables |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boston Harbor | 10 | 250 | 50 | 179 | 71 | 71.60 | 89.50 |
| Centennial | 29 | 695 | 125 | 439.5 | 255.5 | 63.24 | 77.11 |
| Garfield | 21 | 495 | 25 | 283.6 | 211.4 | 57.29 | 60.34 |
| Hansen | 33 | 795 | 150 | 379.2 | 415.8 | 47.70 | 58.79 |
| Lincoln | 13 | 325 | 0 | 302 | 23 | 92.92 | 92.92 |
| LP Brown | 18 | 450 | 25 | 331.6 | 118.4 | 73.69 | 78.02 |
| Madison | 12 | 300 | 0 | 204.7 | 95.3 | 68.23 | 68.23 |
| McKenny | 21 | 525 | 25 | 271.7 | 253.3 | 51.75 | 54.34 |
| McLane | 25 | 595 | 25 | 386 | 209 | 64.87 | 67.72 |
| Pioneer | 25 | 595 | 0 | 381.4 | 213.6 | 64.10 | 64.10 |
| Roosevelt | 24 | 570 | 0 | 341.5 | 228.5 | 59.91 | 59.91 |
| ORLA | 25 | 625 | 0 | 499.6 | 125.4 | 79.94 | 79.94 |
| Elementary Total | 256 | 6220 | 425 | 4000 | 2220 | 64.31 | 69.02 |
| Thurgood Marshall | 29 | 625 | 44.8 | 485.2 | 139.8 | 77.63 | 83.63 |
| Washington | 38 | 839 | 44.8 | 707.6 | 131.4 | 84.34 | 89.10 |
| Jefferson | 33 | 727 | 22.4 | 461.2 | 265.8 | 63.44 | 65.46 |
| Reeves | 28 | 602 | 22.4 | 400.9 | 201.1 | 66.59 | 69.17 |
| Middle Total | 128 | 2793 | 134.4 | 2054.9 | 738.1 | 73.57 | 77.29 |
| Avanti | 17 | 300 | 0 | 183.9 | 116.1 | 61.30 | 61.30 |
| Capital | 76 | 1740 | 46.1 | 1111.3 | 628.7 | 63.87 | 65.61 |
| Olympia | 90 | 2052 | 0 | 1670.7 | 381.3 | 81.42 | 81.42 |
| High School Total | 183 | 4092 | 46.1 | 2965.9 | 1126.1 | 72.48 | 73.31 |
| District Total | 567 | 13105 | 605.5 | 9021 | 4084 | 68.83 | 72.17 |
*The numbers in red for elementary do not add up strictly by the number of learning spaces times 25. We aren’t certain of why, but it may have to do with special education dedicated classrooms that got a smaller allocation of students.