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Lockport voters reject $85 million plan for school repairs after ceiling collapse

By Jim Williams

/ CBS Chicago

CHICAGO (CBS) -- Voters in southwest suburban Lockport have rejected a proposed $85 million referendum to issue bonds for repairs and renovations at Lockport Township High School Central Campus.

The school board was seeking the $85 million bond issue after a ceiling collapse at the 114-year-old building last fall forced the school to close.

"We had a ceiling collapse in room 310," School District 205 Superintendent Robert McBride said. ""It would have caused catastropic injury or fatality if people were in the room. Thank goodness it happened in the evening. That probably changed urgent to dire."

Students have attending classes at the previously vacant Lincoln-Way North High School some 20 miles away in Frankfort while the ceilings are repaired.

Voters on Tuesday rejected the school district's proposed $85 million referendum for repairs and renovations at the school, by a margin of 53.8% to 46.2%.

The Lockport district has gone to voters six times before for more money to renovate the building, failing to get the big bucks approved each time.

How frustrating is it for McBride?

"That's a great question," he said. "Voting is the way that we find out the will of the people … and they've spoken loud and clear."

McBride acknowledged $85 million might be too much of a tax burden for some, and renovation plans might be too extensive. Translation: voters want a less expensive, less extensive fix than what the school district wanted.

"So now our board will shift in decisions to work within the financial tools that we have not to do a complete renovation," he said.

The referendum money would have covered windows and major mechanical systems and updated classrooms; just to name a few things some believe are needed at a school dating back to the World War I era.

While McBride said he respects the voters' voice, he also had a sobering observation.

"The community has assumed a risk, and that risk is that we have another failure, like the one we had [in November,]" he said.

The district hopes to at least have the ceilings shored up and students back in their original school come August.

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