Yesterday, Superintendent Dance announced that a county-owned property near the intersection of Chapel and Joppa Roads would be the site of the new 700-seat elementary school. The recommendation means that school system staff can begin designing the campus, with a goal of opening this Honeygo Elementary School in the summer of 2018.
Working with Councilwoman Cathy Bevins, our office helped secure the funding to make this school possible. I thank County Executive Kamenetz for his support. It is a critical step forward as we deal with school overcrowding in the northeast.
There were three potential sites for this school. One was the Perry Hall location, and the other two were properties near King Avenue and Rossville Boulevard. So how does the Perry Hall location help advance our goal of building another middle and high school?
The King Avenue site, currently Nottingham Park, is an ideal place for a middle school or a shared middle/high school campus. It is already owned by the school system. Placing the elementary school here would have removed a key potential property for the larger campuses.
With the elementary school now set for opening in 2018, my focus will continue to be getting these other campuses programmed for construction. During that time, we will be lightening or delaying development, a process that started in 2012 when the County Council downzoned more than 263 acres in Perry Hall. We also blocked a Planned Unit Development at Perry Hall’s Gerst Farm and more than 1,100 homes in South Perry Hall.