We’ve been told the Lee County School Superintendent will attend the meeting tonight which will be held at the Skip One building on San Carlos Boulevard at 6PM.
Fort Myers Beach parents are still fighting to get the beach school cleaned and open so their kids can go back to school on the island. The kids who were attending the beach school are now being transported off the island to San Carlos Elementary. The School Board recently added a bus stop near the beach school. Parents had been driving their kids to Walmart to catch a bus to the school before the beach bus stop was added.
It was unclear whether the Lee County School Board would be in favor of re-opening the school which was damaged by Hurricane Ian on September 28th. At a workshop last month a majority of board members appeared to be in favor of getting the school open somehow despite its dwindling enrollment.
Town Councilman Jim Atterholt, when discussing the debris removal from the Bay Oaks property on Thursday, said the beach school would be opening again in the Fall.
The school board is considering four options regarding the future of the beach school. They could also modify one of the four options over the next several weeks and months. Here’s what they are considering…
#1) Stabilize the historic building and maintain readiness to reopen which would cost nearly $5 million.
#2) Restore the historic building and utilize if for the 2023-2024 school year which would cost over $10 million.
#3) Restore the historic building and add instructional space at a cost of $20 million.
#4) Restore the historic building and sell the property which would cost $3.7 million.
All four options include remediation and restoration of the historic building on the property.
The beach school was built in 1947 and is the smallest public elementary school in Lee County. In 1999 building #2 of the school was added to the U.S. Register of Historic Places.