CABARRUS COUNTY, N.C. — Cabarrus County leaders will help clear the way to determine what to do next with a Concord elementary school.
The county commission will vote to approve a $20,000 review of Beverly Hills Elementary to determine if renovating it is a cost effective plan.
This is part of the district's larger redistricting plan.
[Beverly Hills Elementary Site Review and Replacement Proposal]
Cabarrus County Board of Education voted earlier this year to temporarily shut down the school to figure out what renovations the school needs and how much it would cost.
Once they have decided on those factors, the Board of Education will decide whether or not they will shut down the school.
Parents have been begging the district to keep Beverly Hills Elementary in downtown Concord open, but the board voted 5-2 Thursday to temporarily shut down the school in 2020 as part of the district's larger redistricting plan.
[Cabarrus County school districting plan]
Parents questioned why the district would want to close the elementary school when the district needs all the space it can for the hundreds of new students who are moving into the district every year.
"We chose this house in this location because of that school,” parent Laura Schuman said.
The district is considering four options that would redraw school boundary lines across the county, sending as many as 6,897 students to different schools.
"What's at stake is our community,” parent Rose Culbreath said.
Under all four options, Beverly Hills Elementary takes the hardest hit because it would be vacated.
Its 425 students could be bused out of Concord and into an elementary school in Kannapolis.
The district said the changes are necessary because it needs to move students out of overcrowded schools and into other schools that still have open seats.
"Our school board made a big mistake in overbuilding and now they correct it by decimating our community,” Culbreath said.
District officials said Beverly Hills Elementary is old and would be too expensive to repair, but some parents said they've done their own homework.
[PAST COVERAGE: Some parents hope to save Cabarrus County elementary school]
"We've got lots of third-party professionals that have confirmed for us that it is absolutely able to be renovated,” Schuman said.
District officials are looking into the possibility of building another school on the same property.
Parents did all they could to fight back by sending out a message to save the school.
District officials said a new state law is complicating things even more by making class sizes even smaller next year.
The board will consider its final plans on redistricting at the end of this year.
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