Numbers.

The Board of Directors of Webster City Community School District on Monday heard numbers that are options for funding and spending as it begins the task of selecting the best way to improve the district’s high school.

Matt Berninghaus, school district superintendent, led the discussion, working from a “facilities roadmap” prepared by a consultant that outlines the ways in which the school system could tackle updating the main core of the building that was formally dedicated in 1962. Voters approved a bond issue of $965,000 to build the then-new high school.

The board is searching for a cost-effective solution to update the classrooms that are now more than 60 years old.

“If we don’t exceed the currently authorized $2.70 debt service levy amount,” Berninghaus told the board, “we could go after about $65.3 million.”

He offered details: “If we went to the public and tried to pass a bond, we could get about 32.2 million (dollars). And that’s with 60 percent approval from our voters. And then we could issue bonds against our save fund for an additional 22.6 million (dollars) and combine that with some additional dollars that we’ve got on hand, about 10.4 million (dollars); that would get us to that 65.3 million that we talked about.

“So we currently have the authority to go up to $2.70.”

The other option, he said, “is we could go up to the $4.08 maximum. That’s going out and asking the public, hey, can we increase taxes by potentially $4.08 and then you’re looking at about 81.5 million, right?”

Not that the board is inclined to do that.

Instead, its discussion centered on more moderate proposals that would cost a projected $39.1 million and keep both the existing competition gym and auditorium, and remodel the classrooms.

The existing courtyard is maintained in this option, but the board discussed potentially using that open space to construct interior space.

On the projected high end is a $72.2 million completely new construction south of the existing track. None of the board members openly supported that option during the meeting Monday.

Beringhaus told the board, “Once I can get some direction from the board in regards to what you’re thinking … We need to get community involved in regards to what potentially this would look like. What’s needed.”

A goal, he said, would be to time the project so that the school system could pay off existing obligations first.