Mundelein High School will ask voters for $175 million
Voters in Mundelein High School District 120 will decide whether to support a $175 million tax increase as part of an extensive renovation and expansion at the school, which opened in 1961.
After upgrading its facilities plan last fall and studying other high schools to determine what was needed at MHS, the District 120 board Tuesday voted to put a capital improvements question on the April 4 ballot.
If approved, the owner of a home valued at $300,000 would pay about $690 more each year in taxes to the district, an increase that would move MHS to the middle of the pack, according to the district. More details are available at the recent news tab at d120.org.
"We don't have the right kind of space for a variety of purposes and we need to keep pace with our growth," Superintendent Kevin Myers said in a news release Wednesday.
The amount being asked of voters represents about three-quarters of the $225 million the district hopes to spend on improvements to the 60-year-old building at 1350 W. Hawley St.
According to the district, $50 million already has been set aside for the plans.
Increasing space for performing arts and athletics and renovating food service areas, which all date to the school's opening, are priorities.
"We are limited in these areas and it creates scheduling problems for both faculty and students," Myers said.
The school auditorium, main gym and cafeteria are original and designed for 1,500 students, and limited space requires four lunch periods. The current enrollment is about 2,206.
Since MHS opened, the number of sanctioned sports has increased from 10 for boys and two for girls to 32 total. That has teams sharing practice spaces, and many practices are pushed deep into the evening, according to the district.
The updated facilities plan calls for more spaces for multipurpose uses and common areas and for larger spaces for performing arts, physical education/athletics, career and technical education and a transition center.
The work will involve reconfiguring the school in some areas but keeping the footprint. A field house addition would be built on the north end of the building, said district spokesman Peter Gill.
An administrative office building just west of the school would be torn down and replaced with a facility for career and technical training, a wellness center and related spaces, he added.
Gill said some outdoor sports facilities would be displaced and moved to the Village Green golf club, which is owned by the district.
The district's decision to seek voter approval comes weeks after a mammoth development on land owned by the Wirtz family was proposed on Mundelein's northwest side.
That announcement highlights the need to update space and make room for new students, Gill said, but the need for MHS is obvious with or without that development.
There were significant additions in 1988, 1991 and 1997, and in 2016 MHS opened a $23.7 million space dedicated to science, technology, engineering and math.