Columbia Falls School District Seeks $84.8 Million Bond
The bond would be for improvements to the high school. The updated building would be able to serve 1,000 students and would enhance the school’s career and technical learning spaces.
By Mariah Thomas
The Columbia Falls School District will ask voters to approve a bond to pay for a high school renovation and addition, focused on enhancing the school’s career and technical learning offerings and bringing all the school’s spaces under one roof.
Voters will be asked whether or not to approve an $84.8 million bond for a 25-year term. For a home with a taxable value of $300,000, the bond is estimated to cost $216.79 in the first year.
“That’s a big number, but I think that number gives us everything we need to extend the life of that building, to extend the size that we need to house a thousand kids, enhance some programs,” Columbia Falls Superintendent Cory Dziowgo said. “It touches every content area in (Principal Josh) Gibbs’ high school, and really fills it out to a nice, updated learning space for our students and our community.”
Dziowgo said the district’s choice to seek a bond came as a result of the high school’s roof issues. In 2024, voters approved a two-year building reserve levy at a cost of $1.375 million per year to replace the roof. That levy will come off the tax rolls in 2026.
But after the roof issues cropped up, Dziowgo said the district took a deeper look at the whole building. The high school, built in 1958, has not seen significant changes since the 1980s. A three-story wing was added to it then, Dziowgo said.
The choice to update the current building, rather than build a new one, came because the district already invested in improvements to it. In addition to the roof replacement, the district used federal Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief (ESSER) dollars to complete a ventilation project. Dziowgo likened the use of those funds to a “head start” on the building enhancements.
“We’re not taking the roof off the instructional wing, we’re not going backwards with any of the federal money that we’ve used already,” he said.
The updated building would be able to serve up to 1,000 students. The floor plan is not set in stone yet. Dziowgo said the district has discussed adding a mechanics bay, enhancing science labs and adding machining options for students. He also said the art annex would be absorbed into the building.
The district hosted community meetings throughout the spring about the potential bond. It also conducted surveys of students, staff and families about the needs at the high school.
“I attended most of the work meetings, and I think one of the pieces that I’m excited about and thankful that we looked at it this way is there’s not one single piece of area that wasn’t reviewed, whether it’s administrative, support, operations,” said Barb Riley, one of the district’s board members.
Riley added that the conversations covered both logistical aspects of the renovations, along with programming options for students.
“We’ve been through the review with the community and the chamber and some of their conversations. What do they want to see?” Riley said. “Because this is their building. This is our community’s building. And there was not one thing that we didn’t touch on in those conversations.”
Ballots will be mailed to voters Oct. 17 and are due Nov. 4.