Fredericksburg City Council on Tuesday approved a comprehensive agreement paving the way for construction of a new middle school to begin this spring, with an anticipated opening in August 2025.
The agreement is a contract between the School Board and First Choice, LLC, the public-private partnership selected by the school division to design and build the new school. City Council, as the elected body that appropriates funding for the school division, must formally approve the agreement.
Deputy school superintendent Matt Eberhardt said the new school is “critical to supporting our students and their families.”
“According to recent Census data, Fredericksburg is the 11th fastest growing locality in Virginia,” he said. “This growth is putting a great deal of pressure on our school system and its facilities. Without a new school, we will not be able to serve our citizens adequately or provide a 21st-century education to our students. “
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Council voted 6–1 to approve the agreement, with at-large member Matt Kelly voting against it.
Kelly has voiced concerns about the cost of the school throughout the process of negotiating the comprehensive agreement and determining funding sources.
On Tuesday he said he still doesn’t feel he has all the information he needs about the fiscal impact of the project, including the operating and transportation costs of the new school.
“I am not saying there is not a capacity issue,” Kelly said. “I am not in any way jumping on our teachers, but they have some significant challenges, and those challenges are not going to be dealt with in bricks and mortar. Going down this road is going to tie our hands on being able to deal with these issues.”
The other six council members expressed their support for the new middle school, which will allow Walker–Grant Middle School to be converted into a third elementary school.
“This is a necessary step for our elementary school-aged children,” said Jason Graham, who was a member of the joint city-schools task force that in 2021 recommended building a new middle school to meet capacity challenges. “This new middle school is to provide us with a third elementary school. We currently have two of the largest elementary schools in the state.”
Graham said that studies show the learning environment matters at the elementary age.
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“One of the things [council member Kerry Devine] and I learned is that specifically, the size of the school has a material and significant impact on student performance in grades K–5,” he said. “That is the problem we are looking to solve right off the bat, which the size of a school has been shown to do.”
The new 140,000-square-foot school, which will be located in the Idlewild neighborhood, will accommodate 1,100 students.
As part of the comprehensive agreement, City Council approved a contract cost limit of $77 million. Assistant city manager Mark Whitley told council members that a guaranteed maximum price will be determined based on 90 percent of the design being completed and the number—which will be equal to or lower than the contract cost limit—will be available in April.
Council has approved issuing bonds to pay for $58 million of the construction cost. The remainder will come from city and school funds.
One source of funding is still unclear. Staff initially built in an estimate of about $7 million from a new statewide grant program for school construction and modernization.
Whitley said staff were originally confident the project would be eligible to receive 10% of the total cost from the grant program, based on language in the state budget approved by the General Assembly. However, the Board of Education in October released draft guidelines for grant eligibility that muddied the waters, he said.
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School division deputy superintendent Matt Eberhardt said both the city and schools are putting on a “full court press,” enlisting lobbyists, two former secretaries of education, local legislators and the Virginia Association of School Superintendents to raise concerns about the draft guidelines and “position [the middle school] project to receive funding this year or next year.”
Whitley said city staff are working on a plan to “make good on that $7 million” if state funding does not come in.
Adele Uphaus: 540/735-1973
auphaus@freelancestar.com
@flsadele
