Despite facing a short timeline for constructing a new central office and vacating its current property near Southtown, San Antonio Independent School District pushed back approving designs for district headquarters Monday night so officials can gather more community input.
Trustees delayed approving building plans for the proposed three-story, 140,000-square-foot structure that will sit adjacent to San Pedro Creek Park and across the street from the Fox Tech campus on what is now the school’s football field.
District administrators plan to use the proposed facility to consolidate 30 departments located in six different facilities. An estimated 625 employees will work in the new building.
A decision about preserving green space on the campus caused the delay. District officials presented trustees with two options: having green space border the creek or located closer to the Fox Tech campus along North Flores Street. But some expressed concern about making a decision before getting input from parents.
“My fear is that the parents and the stakeholders that advocated so assertively to maintain that green space would see this as creating a public park and not creating learning space,” said trustee Steve Lecholop. “Now I don’t know this, and I don’t think any of us know this, because we haven’t engaged the parents or the stakeholders to ask these questions and that ultimately is my concern.”
Until recently, SAISD was tentatively planning to keep the green space closer to Flores Street with easy access for students and staff. Then the San Antonio River Authority proposed switching the green space to abut the creek and create more of a continuous outdoor park. Depending on the space’s location, the area could grow by a few tenths of an acre.
In February, the district sold the land where its offices currently are located for $14.5 million to the group that redeveloped the Pearl. In the sale agreement, SAISD arranged to lease the land from the buyers for 28 months for $100 a year.
Construction on new headquarters was slated to begin in April and was expected to be completed for an August 2020 move-in date. Despite a delay in voting to approve the plans, Superintendent Pedro Martinez said he hopes that is still the case, but the priority is getting everyone’s feedback on the plan.
Funding to construct the facility comes from the sale of Southtown property and sale of other properties at Alamo and Austin streets and a food service warehouse.
The office will be built at the site of the football field that sits adjacent to Fox Tech High School and near San Pedro Creek Park. Fox Tech doesn’t have a football team and therefore doesn’t use it for football practices, although community members often use the track that circles around the field.
Earlier this summer, SAISD sought input on the headquarters plan in a series of public meetings. Parents expressed concerns that losing the football field would lessen the availability of outdoor space for students.
SAISD plans to present parents with the options for green space to get feedback and bring the decision to the board. Martinez said he hopes SARA will explain why it prefers having the green space site adjacent to the creek.
This may delay the construction process, pushing back needed city approvals. Trustee Debra Guerrero said if collecting input meant pushing the schedule, the district could negotiate their leasing agreement at their current district headquarters to extend the timeline.
Looks like tilt wall construction one would find in North Korea. San Antonio needs to have all governmental agencies build attractive durable structures. This is grey and boring, which reminds me of school come to think of it.
What an utter embarrassment that is. Both design and renderings appear to have been created by a child.
A grey box with Fiesta colors…..groundbreaking
SAISD does what it wants so why even pretend to care about community input?
Seriously ugly. After the county and city put so much thought and into the landscape and architecture of the San Pedro Creek Culture Park, this monstrosity needs to be as far away from the park as possible. Perhaps the folks they sold the current headquarters to (Graystreet) can help SAISD develop some better ideas. After all, they have done marvelous things at the Pearl, turning blighted properties into the magnet the Pearl area has become.
OK. Because of the previous comments I feel like I should step in for whoever’s project that is. That design and rendering is probably the direct result of school district’s budget and scope but not as much the architect’s fault as you might think.
Not all architects get the freedom of San Antonio’s most prized architecture firms whose work we all know very well. Many times the developer or the client dictates the majority of the design/building type to the architect before they get any say on design. That’s just a reality.
Furthermore, those high end schematic design firms wouldn’t even bother with this work after hearing they couldn’t create three stories of curtain wall or some sort of edgy exposed structure somehow tied to a social/environmental commentary that would promise design awards and endless publication in the end. Low cost tilt-wall with simple fenestration to meet the client’s parameters of a large building/small budget project on an impossibly short time frame from first meet and greet to CA punch list is just not what they do. It would be hiring a stone sculptor to build a brick wall. Sometimes you just need that brick wall and not the Pietà.
The majority of buildings that get built are not the jewel boxes that usually reach publication. Not every client/or even most clients out there have that kind of budget. We are talking about SAISD here. You think their budget isn’t a contentious topic and merits lavish spending on a HQ? Get ready to be laughed out of the room by every parent in town. Perception of that reality seems incredibly skewed probably due to the fact that building’s that usually get published are strikingly beautiful and very expensive. I wish the RR would report a price per SF or an associated overall budget with development sf so that you could grasp that concept. What you will see as a difference between this and those projects is a stark contrast in budget. Millions. Tens of millions.
No it’s not the best design. The architect could do better than this, yes. They probably had little room in the school district’s budget for design, but could and should do better with what they have to work with. The rendering was probably created by an intern or someone newer to the profession. To say it’s an embarrassment is just rude, really snobby.
Imagine if the school district blew their budget on a beautiful/ego boosting feel good building for their HQ like Apple or HEB or any number of banks when they already have a deficit in funding for much more important priorities. Imagine the rightful indignation of the parents or even underpaid teachers in that instance. Then I’d say you’d have room to cry about the HQ building design all day. But only because they spent the money selfishly. Put the money where it counts. The design of this building is not where it counts the most…that priority is already made clear via typology. No need to insult them and be a snob about it on top of it.
Hi Richard – I checked with SAISD and the price per square foot is $200, making the overall price of the building $28 million in addition to $2 million for site work, which includes demolition, green space, landscaping, fences, and sidewalks.
Richard, what you say is undoubtedly 100% true, but SAISD has shown that it CAN approve nice design when it wants to. For example, the 2010 Bond produced some really nice examples at Hawthorne Academy and Alamo Stadium – nothing extravagant, just nicely detailed.
I pay SAISD taxes (with kids in SAISD schools), and while I appreciate the economy of this administration building, I do think a bit more design is entirely appropriate.