Texas Monthly is against ’em.
As a part of a $220 million bond package, McKinney ISD is adding an opulent events center and 12,000-seat high school football stadium that will cost a total of $62.8 million. According to the Dallas Morning News, the stadium, set to open in 2017, will cost $50.3 million itself with $12.5 million used from a previous bond package passed in 2000 that will go towards stadium infrastructure: roads, water, sewer, electricity. Manhattan Construction has been hired to build the stadium, and if that name rings a bell, it’s because they were behind Houston’s NRG Stadium, Globe Life Park, and AT&T Stadium—home of the Dallas Cowboys of Arlington. The bond package also includes $62.5 million for upgrades throughout the district, with $51.4 million allocated toward additions and renovations to six of the schools in the district.
There will be $30.5 million spent on technology, including a program that would give all entering freshman a laptop. Three of the schools will see renovations to fine arts facilities, which sounds good, sure, until you consider that it will only bring them up to par. Cockrill Middle School, Evans Middle School, and McKinney Boyd High School’s fine arts programs have been burdened with “overcrowding in the band halls, lack of storage, practice space and congested fine arts hallways.” Meanwhile, the sanctuary of gladiator arts will sparkle in McKinney.
Placing athletics over academics and the arts is a tale as old as time. Sports—well, male-dominated athletics, particularly football and basketball—have more eyes and glory involved than pretty much every other high school institution outside of prom, and even then there’s room for debate. But the fact of the matter is that high school football, though we tend to spend exuberant amounts of money on it, doesn’t yield great returns. In 2011, the Dallas Morning News’ sports section conducted an investigation of Dallas-area football teams and their profitability, and only three districts had a net profit. McKinney’s had a net loss of $208,889.35.
I can’t say I approve of these big-ticket expenditures, either, but the voters did approve them. Obviously, only a few lucky (read: wealthy) school districts can provide this kind of extravagance for their students, but that’s not all that different than how we fund education in general, and we know what the Supreme Court thinks about that. I suppose many people would care less about how much McKinney and Allen and Katy spent on their football teams if our public schools were adequately and equitably funded in general, but we don’t live in that world. If everyone who is now complaining about McKinney’s event center worked towards that world, maybe we could.
“I suppose many people would care less about how much McKinney and Allen and Katy spent on their football teams if our public schools were adequately and equitably funded in general, but we don’t live in that world. If everyone who is now complaining about McKinney’s event center worked towards that world, maybe we could.”
should i file the federal lawsuit myself, what?
This is one area where HISD excels. No signs of any sports palaces here. Most districts would do well to emulate Delmar Stadium. It is good enough.
Ross,
I could not agree more. Skyrocketing property taxes are taxing people out of their homes. What good is a semi pro stadium if people have to move out of the district because they cannot afford to live in that district anymore?