No room for error in Dist. 204

This time around, Indian Prairie Unit District 204 should be able to go about selecting a site for a new high school the right way. Because it has the benefit of knowing how to do this the wrong way. Mistakes can be very educational.

The school district charted a singular course for the school site -- the so-called Brach-Brodie land. But it didn't see the iceberg coming -- an unfavorable court ruling -- and it ripped a hole in the hull of this plan. Brach-Brodie isn't sunk, but it sure is listing badly off port.

The price of the Brach-Brodie land was put into the hands of a jury after the school district filed for condemnation. The jury decided that spot of land is worth $31 million -- $17 million more than the district anticipated.

It's still hard to imagine the district not having projected an adverse verdict as a possibility in pursuing this land, and not having had a back-up plan in that case. Or looked at other sites that didn't have legal entanglements. Now the district is looking at other places for the school; sites it says it can buy within budget that would match the specifications for a new school.

That is not what we heard before. We distinctly remember some District 204 school board candidates, who did think it wise to look at other sites and have a backup plan, being dismissed as unrealistic and uninformed. Brach-Brodie, it was said, was clearly the best choice.

District 204 has not slammed the door on trying to acquire Brach-Brodie at its price through a new trial. But that just doesn't seem to loom large as a practical solution.

We do agree with the school district on a couple of major points.

One, a new high school has to be built. We aren't persuaded by arguments by some that building a third high school isn't even necessary, because enrollment figures don't justify it.

Two, don't try to proceed with the Brach-Brodie site at the jury's price, making up the difference between the ruling and what the district has budgeted by building a much less expensive, scaled-down school. The community is clearly not going to accept a new school that is not even close to being comparable to Neuqua Valley and Waubonsie Valley high schools. Why should they?

So District 204 is now where it could have been before -- looking at different sites that it can afford and that would be the least disruptive in establishing attendance boundaries.

Yes, the school district, with a new site, will have to go through another round of boundary hearings -- just 21 months after an emotionally draining and tense establishment of boundaries in expectation of the new school being built on the Brach-Brodie property.

But maybe something was learned from those contentious boundary-setting sessions that might make it a bit easier this time around.

Of course, what answer will there be to the anguished who will ask, why do we have to go through this again? That we learned from our mistakes?