Following the decision to lease out land where the former district office was housed to bring in much-needed funds, the Ravenswood City School District is exploring how it will pay for a new office that is estimated to cost $10 million to construct. The district may use $4 million in its remaining bond funds for the project.

During an Oct. 26 school board meeting, trustees opted to explore two options: paying for the facility itself or seeking outside funds. The school board nixed a third option to consider a 50-50 split between district funding and outside funding for the project.

The board also gave staff approval to begin working with an architect to design and scope the preferred site of the new district office.

District officials said they preferred to house the new office on a field off Bay Road, adjacent to the district's planned Bay Road Community Hub, which is still in the design process.

This location allows the district to piggyback on the community hub for parking, landscaping, utilities and more to save money on the project, according to a staff presentation for the Oct. 26 meeting.

The district office has been located at 2120 Euclid Ave. in East Palo Alto, but the school district signed an agreement with developer USA Properties to lease the space for 400 and 450 affordable housing units. The proposal retains district ownership of the land as well as a 50% profit sharing agreement. The base rent for the property will start at $1.6 million.

Staff noted that constructing a new district office is will cost significantly less than the $40 million (roughly $60 million in 2023 dollars) previously contemplated in the 2015 Facilities Master Plan. Staff said the $10 million project is a large dollar figure, but it's only about 4% of the total investment being put into school facilities.

Other sources of funding could come from redevelopment funds ($4 million) and a $1 million federal solar rebate, staff notes.

Measure I, a $110 million facilities bond measure passed by voters in 2022, would be the source of the bond funds for the new district office.

Financing options explored

Over the past year, staff explored a number of ways to pay for the new facility through partnerships and other leases, but these approaches have "largely been unsuccessful." At this point, the best path may be to proceed with directly paying for the new office, according to staff.

The district considered partnering with the city of East Palo Alto to include the district office in its new library; working with an outside donor to donate to a district office; soliciting an outside donor to build a new community hub including the entire district office; developing a ground lease with a developer that would build both housing and the district office; or partnering with local nonprofits to explore shared office space (such as EPA Archives, the Black History Museum, Stanford University, etc.).

Chief Business Officer Will Eger told the board at the Oct. 26 meeting that he couldn't find a developer interested in building housing and putting the district office on the first floor of such a project, noting that he doubted he would get buy in from trustees on such a plan anyway.

Project timeline

District officials are still occupying the district office, which will eventually be demolished. Officials plan to move out in about a year and a half, depending on the permitting process, Eger said on Monday, Nov. 20.

The district office is likely two or three times larger than what is currently needed, according to a January 2021 facilities update for the board.

The district plans to stay at the office as long as possible while it's designing and constructing the new space, Eger said.

The district office was originally under an agreement with a New York-based company that sought to build a seven- or eight-story life science lab and office project, but after the two parted ways, the RCSD decided to use the property for housing.

Watch a video of the meeting here: