Working to ensure the children of our future have the same opportunity we had - a first class education in St. Paul through the year 2047, the 200th anniversary of the establishment of the first school in Osage Mission.

First School Established May 10, 1847

December 2, 2007. The floor plan for the new school addition has now been finalized. It will include five general-purpose classrooms, art room, music room, science lab, k-12 library / media center, two locker rooms, and a gymnasium with seating capacity near 1,000. This addition will total nearly 35,000 square feet. Current plans are to relocate the high school, grades 9-12, to the new addition. A copy of the approved floor plan is provided below.

May 24, 2007. The architect's drawings of the proposed addition to St. Paul School are provided below. A second public forum will be held in the St. Paul School multipurpose room on Wednesday, May 30th beginning at 7:00 p.m. Please encourage everyone to vote, and vote Yes, for this beautiful and much needed addition to our school. This addition will benefit many generations of children, will be a source of pride for our community, and will generate excitement leading to even more growth in our community.

The St. Paul Schools Alumni & Friends Association fundraising campaign for this project now stands at $770,000, just $30,000 shy of our goal of $800,000. Thank you to everyone near and far who has responded to our fundraising appeal. Your generosity and support is truly overwhelming.

Proposed Addition - North View

Proposed Addition - North View Enlarged

Proposed Addition - Southeast View

Proposed Addition - Southeast View Enlarged

School Addition - Floor Plan

March 19, 2007. The most recent issue of The District Dispatch (Volume 2, Number 8) provides the most recent information about the bond election that will be decided upon by district patrons at a special election on Tuesday, June 5th. The budget is reproduced below. The latest architectural drawings will be posted as soon as they are available to the public.

March 15, 2007

Dear Friends of St. Paul Schools:

This is our second letter to update you on the status of Phase I of Vision 2047: Building for the Future of Our Youth. If you have already responded with a donation or pledge, thank you!

The Chetopa – St. Paul school district has now finalized plans for a 33,000 square feet addition to the St. Paul campus. This addition is to include a media center / library, music room, art room, four classrooms, administrative office, and a gymnasium with locker rooms and weight room. The proposed addition will be attached to, and east of, the current elementary school.

This addition to the St. Paul campus will be financed with a school district bond issue. That bond issue will also include additions to the Chetopa school and technology upgrades for both campuses. The projected cost of the entire project is $8.5 million. A special election has been scheduled for Tuesday, June 5^th, at which time a majority of patrons in USD 505 Chetopa – St. Paul School District must approve the bond issue.

Proposed additions at the St. Paul campus account for about 75 percent of the total cost even though our enrollment at St. Paul is slightly less than the enrollment at Chetopa. The school district feels that St. Paul’s potential for growth and our legitimate need for a substantial upgrade justify this expenditure at St. Paul. The Alumni Association agrees, and hopes that voters in both St. Paul and Chetopa will vote yes on the bond issue.

We are writing to ask for your financial support for this project. Please complete the pledge card on the back of this letter and return it no later than April 15^th, 2007. Our fundraising goal is $800,000 and we have raised $535,000; we need your help to raise another $265,000 by April 15^th!

Since we began our fundraising appeal for Vision 2047, we have received several questions and the remainder of this letter is an attempt to address these concerns.

How will the Alumni Association use my donation? Will my money stay in St. Paul? The Alumni Association will invest your funds and use the principal and interest to help the school district make the annual payments needed to repay the bonds. Since the proposed addition at St. Paul will cost substantially more than our fundraising goal, your money will be paying for part of the new building in St. Paul.

Why not just use the private funds to reduce the size of the bond issue? It is confusing to raise private money as part of a bond issue. We agree, and the reason is that a state program will pay for 52 percent of the total cost of our bond issue. By including the total cost of the project in the bond issue, rather than taking the private donations “off the top”, we effectively double your gift to St. Paul Schools. By using private donations to help repay the bond issue we are using your donation of $1 to help pay for more than $2 of improvements at St. Paul Schools.

What if I want to support this project, but not until I know the bond issue has passed? The school district needs to be able to tell the district taxpayers how much their taxes will increase if they approve this bond issue. They can not do that until they know how much the Alumni Association has raised toward this project. Please, if you want to support this project, send us your pledge card by April 15^th. If the building project does not move forward, then you may choose to designate your donation for future building projects or cancel your pledge.

Is my contribution going to make a difference? It sounds like the district voters will really make the decision. Your contribution will make a significant difference by helping lower the tax burden thereby convincing the taxpayers, especially in Chetopa, that the large addition in St. Paul has merit. Remember, the majority of the voters in USD 505 Chetopa – St. Paul must approve this bond issue. We are a single, unified school district.

Finally, we’d like to take this opportunity to ask all school district patrons to vote yes on this bond issue on June 5^th. Together we can ensure that St. Paul Schools will continue to provide, “Quality Education through Generations.” Thank you.

Sincerely,

[Signature File Intentionally Omitted]

Daniel E. Vitt, President

Sponsored by the

St. Paul Schools Alumni & Friends Association

P. O. Box 263, Saint Paul, Kansas  66771

alumni@vision2047.org

"Quality Education Through Generations"

Link to Temporary Alumni & Friends Association Website: Click Here