'Please build responsibly,' Walton school official urges residential developers

FREEPORT — The Walton County School District's facilities planner is urging developers to "build responsibly" as the school district struggles to find land and construction dollars to build schools for the influx of young people that burgeoning residential development is bringing.

"One comment I would like to put out there is to ask the developers if they could please build responsibly, because with these developments it does generate children in our area," the School District's Michelle Doggett told the Walton County Technical Review Committee (TRC) on Wednesday. 

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"You're creating communities," she added. "You're creating places for people to live. Think about that, and think about the children that it generates. This is our future. We must do the right thing."

The TRC, comprising representatives of various government departments and chaired by Walton County Planning Director Mac Carpenter, is the first public stop for review of development proposals, many of which go on for further review in front of the Walton County Planning Commission and for final decisions by the Walton County Board of County Commissioners.

Doggett's comments came as the TRC was considering two large residential proposals.

One of them, for a proposed 162-apartment development on nearly 10 acres off Goldsby Road north of U.S. Highway 98, will be back in front of the TRC next month for further review. It could be in front of the Planning Commission by mid-April as the result of Wednesday's TRC decision.

The larger of the two proposals, a proposed 392-unit mix of apartments and townhomes that also will include a convenience store and other commercial space — all on 28 acres on State Road 20 some 3 miles west of U.S. Highway 331 at County Road 83A in Freeport — will require the approval of a conditional use application by the county's Zoning Board of Adjustments.

But like the Goldsby Road proposal, the Freeport project likely will be in front of the Planning Commission in mid-April before going to the County Commission for a final decision, under terms of a TRC decision Wednesday.

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According to projections from the School District included in the discussion of the project proposed for State Road 20 and County Road 83A, the 392 units would bring 56 new students into the county school system. Thirty-two of those students would be of elementary school age and would attend Freeport Elementary School, which is already at 104% of capacity, according to information presented to the TRC.

The School District is adding 11 classrooms to Freeport Elementary, according to Doggett. The district also is building a middle school in the Hammock Bay development on land donated by its developer, Jay Odom.

"However, we do not have an additional site to build an elementary school, which is our greatest need," Doggett told TRC members.

In more general comments on the dilemma facing the School District, Doggett said that as the student population grows, the district "just does not have the capability to go out all the time and continue to buy 30 ... acres at a time, because that takes away from the (funding for) the building that we have to do in order to create these (needed) schools."

However, the district has purchased 120 acres in the south end of the county for any needed school or schools in that area, Doggett noted.

She added that the School District is hamstrung by the way the state Department of Education grants permission for school construction. The state waits until growth in the student population is evident before granting permission to build new facilities, which effectively prohibits local districts from addressing anticipated needs.

"We can't build off of projections," Doggett told the TRC.

Further complicating the funding picture for local school construction is that state dollars made available for that purpose are figured on a cost-per-student basis, Doggett said. That doesn't address factors like land costs, which are particularly high in a growing Walton County.

Responding to a question from Carpenter about whether she thought that developers should set aside land for schools in their proposals, Doggett said that there might be other possibilities, such as a developer funding construction of a new wing on an existing school.

In the end, Doggett said all that the School District is asking is for developers to "work with us."