The Jacksonville-North Pulaski School Board voted Monday to buy four acres adjacent to Tolleson Elementary School on Harris Road between General Samuels and Jacksonville Middle School for the site of the district’s first new elementary school.
Students at Tolleson and Arnold Drive elementary on the air base will attend the new school, which will open in August 2018.
The district had been expected to lease property from the base, which had offered land along its perimeter and up to $6 million in aid. But the lease could not be negotiated in time with the Defense Department because there’s a long waiting list in several states for such aid.
The new site will require less dirt work, and the high-spec perimeter fence at the base won’t have to be moved. The site is less than a mile from the Harris Road gate at the base. The four acres were made available for $15,000 an acre.
It’s another giant step for the new district, which has just demolished the old middle school for a new high school on the 30-acre site. After a 40-year wait, the new district’s building program is now on schedule.
