The School District of River Falls is grateful for the longstanding support the community has for our district.
This webpage will be updated regularly to provide the River Falls community with transparent financial information and updates on facilities projects made possible by the February 2024 facilities bond.
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Since the successful referendum, River Falls has been working through initial planning steps. These steps include verifying the existing conditions of the schools, working through the design and construction schedules, and early engagement with some of the schools' staff.
To ensure proper design, the district has created a "Core Planning Team''. This team is made up of administration members, a school board member, and partners from both Bray Architects and Kraus-Anderson Construction. During the design phase, the Core Planning team will continue to meet bi-weekly, engage with staff and routinely review budgets to ensure the projects are on track.
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SEPTEMBER 2024
PLANNING & DESIGN UPDATE
The Core Planning Team has been focused on making sure the new Transportation Center, multipurpose room addition, and the security and building system upgrades align with the approved referendum. To assist with this process, we have had meetings with user groups and select staff along with our engineering partners to make sure all the necessary infrastructure upgrades are captured within the scope of work. The design team has been using the latest 3D technology to scan the schools to ensure this information is accurately captured.
view update in PDF format
WHAT'S NEXT?
- Continue Core Planning Team meetings
- Engineering coordination
- Work through interior design concepts
- Interior finish/material discussions
- Work with City of River Falls on local approvals
SCHEDULE
- Design completion - November 2024
- Tennis court construction starts - Fall 2024
- Bids due - early 2025
- Construction starts - Spring 2025
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demolition at new transportation center site
River Falls High School - multipurpose room rendering
new transportation center - training/break room rendering
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May 2024: Positive Progress
With support from voters for our $28M referendum projects, the district has solidified our bond details for financing these projects. Although our conservative estimates were explained at a 5.25% interest rate on financing these projects, we have successfully locked-in at a much lower 4.14% interest rate, which decreases the impact on taxpayers.
Now that we have confirmed our bond debt structure at a lower rate, the actual tax impact is estimated to be at $51 per $100,000 home value in each year. This is lower than the anticipated tax impact that was shared prior to the referendum!
Facilities Projects Update:
The District’s Design and Planning Team has been meeting regularly, including with user groups, to discuss, gather feedback and begin designing the referendum facility projects. Once these preliminary design specifications are complete, details will be finalized to allow construction bids to be let out publicly. Through those discussions it has been determined that a 2-story design for the high school multipurpose space is most advantageous from a user perspective and financial impact. The overall square feet dimensions and related budget will remain within the same parameters explained to the public prior to the referendum vote.
In addition, the district is planning to build the new Transportation Center on the recently-purchased property adjacent to the current site. These, and the majority of the other remaining referendum projects, will begin in summer 2025.
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