ABOVE: Granada-Huntley-East Chain School is considering a potential referendum to add on to its school building. Sentinel file photo.

GRANADA–Over 20 parents and community members attended Thursday’s first Community Check-In public meeting at Grandad-Huntley-East Chain to discuss a potential referendum.

Since the last referendum in 2016, the student population has increased from 221 to 296. With this growth, space in the current building is becoming tight.

Under Minnesota Department of Education recommendations, the current GHEC school is nearly 100 percent capacity. The usage of several classrooms and school spaces has had to be changed and shifted to fit everything in the current school.

By percentage over MDE guidelines for area per student, Community and Technical Education (CTE) and Cafeteria areas currently have the tightest situations. CTE is 43 percent over the recommended area per student, while Cafeteria is 45 percent over.

The GHEC School Board presented its first draft of a potential referendum incorporating these concerns. It has three main points, adding two classrooms, renovating the small gym locker rooms for better utilization and expanding the kitchen.

This is a preliminary plan, presented mainly to get feedback from the community.

The two classrooms could either be stacked vertically or placed horizontally. ICS Project Manager Ryan Hoffman said it’d be more likely they do so horizontally, making it easier to implement required Storm Shelter components.

Hoffman said the locker room space is underutilized and could be renovated to make better use of the area.

“Let’s reconfigure it for some potential locker rooms for either school activities or guests come through sports activities,” he said. “Add a couple bathrooms for staff. You could get some storage and reorganize this to make it more useful.”

Expansion of the kitchen could include renovation of the kitchen space and two smaller additions, for a loading dock space and an additional freezer room.

A constituent at the meeting asked, if it was only the kitchen being expanded and added on to, how would that address the cafeteria space concern. Hoffmann said the expansion would also push the kitchen backward, providing more cafeteria space.

Overall, the preliminary first draft referendum currently sits at a cost of $5.5 million. Any referendum passed would have 57 percent paid for by the state via the Ag2School program. For example, if a $5.5 million referendum were to be passed, only $2.365 million would go to the taxpayer. This would give an average $65 a year home tax and $0.57 per acre a year acre tax impact.

Circling back to the CTE space which is currently nearly half of what’s recommended per MDE standards, a citizen asked how much a CTE addition would cost. School board member Laura Koch said it would be $720,000. Hoffman said the CTE space could be used to fulfill the Storm Shelter requirement, making the classroom portion of a potential referendum cheaper.

Hoffman then opened the floor to the public, asking what obstacles could be faced in passing a referendum. One parent said they had already passed a referendum 10 years ago, and doing another one so close could be a harder sell.

A potential referendum will be the subject of several more discussions moving forward. GHEC school board members encouraged community feedback and said they could be reached via phone or email. If a referendum is settled, it would go to a vote in November 2025.

Contact information can be found at https://www.ghec.k12.mn.us/page/school-board.

In other news, the board:

— Approved the 2025-26 budget at $7.1 million. The expenses are fully covered by already available funds.

— Approved moving banking funds from pledged securities to an Insured Cash Sweep. Martin County Profinium President Ian Bents said the move would make their insurance situation more flexible, automated, and modern than their current arrangement.

— Heard from Secondary Principal Andy Walden who discussed a potential handbook change. He wants to add a component addressing Artificial Intelligence in the academic integrity section. “I think it will be helpful and supportive to teachers,” Walden said.