Freshman Arturo Medrano paused before entering a first-floor bathroom at East High School — braving the ever-present odor that brings to mind a campground privvy or an old portable toilet.
“They stink,” Medrano said of the school’s bathrooms. “They need to be replaced because they stink.”
Foul-smelling bathrooms are the No. 1 complaint that principal John Youngquist receives from students.
“We maintain them, and they are clean,” Youngquist said. “They are just 84 years old.”
Fixing aged bathrooms in Denver Public Schools is just one area of repair in the sprawling $454 million bond measure on November’s ballot.
Denver’s is the largest school bond in Colorado’s history and would pay for a host of repairs and improvements:
• Critical and safety needs, including roofs, boilers and plumbing, and upgrading health and safety codes: $273.3 million.
• Renovating North High School: $34 million.
• Building a Green Valley Ranch campus, including a K-8 for 750 students and a high school for 450 students: $48.5 million.
• Synthetic turf at five high schools: $12.8 million.
• Playground structures at 37 schools and playground shade at 12 schools: $29 million.
The bond has a maximum repayment of $990 million by the time it is paid off in 2033, but DPS officials project the total will be significantly lower based on current rates.
Property owners would pay $5 a year for every $100,000 of assessed valuation.
No organized opposition has formed, but some residents are upset about how the district has spent money in the past.
Neighbors near the old Byers school that has been shuttered say DPS in 2003 promised to fix the school with $8 million in bond money but never did.
“It was a bait and switch,” said Merce Lea. “I am hesitant on backing the bond if I’m not sure where (the district) will spend the money.”
Some charter-school advocates are upset the district is dedicating only $20 million for “new programs” to be housed in existing buildings and don’t have a separate charter fund.
District officials say Denver, which is Colorado’s oldest district, needs about $800 million worth of upkeep but the essential fixes were put into this year’s bond.
“We are concerned about the roofs and windows and tuckpointing that would close down buildings if it doesn’t get done,” said Mark Bollinger, DPS’s associate executive director of facilities.
District officials recently toured schools to point out needs.
East High School, built in 1924, has plumbing problems that have contributed to the “smell,” chipped terra cotta and cracks in the exterior and numerous other infrastructure woes. Fixes at East will total $7.1 million.
In Park Hill’s 100-year-old school, the same boiler still operates from when classes began in 1908. The octopus-like gas furnace no longer burns coal but sits in the cellar next to quarters for the custodian who nightly fed the furnace.
“If this died in the middle of the day, we wouldn’t be able to have school,” said principal Tonda Potts about the boiler.
The school would get $2.97 million in work, including fire sprinklers, new bathrooms and roof repairs.
Children say the school’s bathrooms are haunted by a ghost they’ve named “Bloody Mary” because water sometimes backs up and appears to be red because of the floor paint, Potts said.
And, as East High’s principal Youngquist says, bathrooms are high priority.
“A bathroom is a basic measure of cleanliness,” he said.
Even for a ghost.
Jeremy P. Meyer: 303-954-1367 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com
