Welcome to the DJUSD Bond Program Newsletter

This e-newsletter will be published regularly to provide our community with updates on all Bond projects and other important facility upgrades happening in DJUSD.

You’ll notice a continued theme throughout this newsletter: DSA. DSA is an abbreviation for Division of the State Architect. DSA provides design and construction oversight for California K-12 schools and ensures that we create and develop safe, accessible, and sustainable educational facilities. For more information on this process and what it means, please visit the DSA website.

Thanks to a competitive and favorable market, DJUSD has sold the remaining Bonds. This early sale will save Davis taxpayers $79 million in interest over the life of the Bonds. In anticipation of the Bond sale, the Board of Education prioritized nine signature projects to be completed from the Measure M funds before 2025, with 85% of the funds to be committed within three years of the Bond sale. Signature Projects include Emerson Science Classrooms, Multipurpose rooms (MPRs) for Birch Lane, César Chávez, North Davis, and Willett Elementary, Korematsu Preschool Campus, Da Vinci High School Tech Hub, and the Davis High School STEM Building and Aquatic Center.

Plans for this project were submitted to DSA in May of 2020 and are in the final stages of DSA review. Approval is expected in the coming weeks, at which point this project will enter a Bidding and Approval of Contracts phase and a construction firm will be selected by our Board of Education. Please visit our website to follow progress on this and other Bond Projects within our District.

To date, all planned multipurpose room projects have completed the Programming Phase and the initial community outreach presentations. Birch Lane Elementary will be the first MPR project to proceed to DSA review in late August. North Davis, César Chávez, and Willett Elementary MPR projects will follow with a projected DSA review submittal in November of 2020. A final placement decision for César Chávez MPR is expected in July and there will be a virtual community presentation announced in the near future. A second round of community outreach for Willett and North Davis Elementary Schools is tentatively planned for August. Watch for those details by email, on the Chávez, Willett and North Davis websites, respectively, and through Nextdoor (Davis) and DJUSD social media. We are excited to share progress with you on all MPR Bond Projects over the course of the next few months.

As we roll into the summer, we are happy to report the Programming phase of the new preschool campus, which will be located on the Korematsu Elementary School campus, is complete. The schematic design for this project was approved by the Board of Education on June 18. A public outreach meeting on this project will be announced soon. Construction for the new preschool campus is expected to begin in September 2020, with a projected opening date in February of 2022. Because traffic is a concern for the Korematsu neighborhood, DJUSD has been in regular conversations with the City of Davis on possible ways to design the new parking lot for drop off and pick up to mitigate congestion in that area. These conversations are ongoing and will inform the way the entry and exit, drop off and special education bus loop are ultimately constructed. Preschool classes will remain at the Valley Oak campus for the 2020-21 school year and we look forward to the day when our new preschool campus is open at Korematsu. Please refer to our website for site specific information about this Bond Project.

DJUSD has begun programming outreach for the Bond Projects for Davis Senior High School (DSHS) campus, beginning with the Davis Senior High School staff. There are designated subcommittees of DSHS staff members advising the progress of the STEM building project and the Aquatic Center project. During this Programming phase, discussion regarding location options for the STEM building and the Aquatic Center are underway, with the goal of eliminating, or greatly reducing, the cost of potential interim housing. Interim housing is defined as space to continue classroom instruction in a different location on campus, during construction in order to build the new building where older buildings once were located. Stay tuned for much more information. We remain in the very early stages of these projects and soon will have more news to share about the schematic designs and next steps. Watch our website and Bond News feed for specific information in the coming months.

DJUSD is in the process of installing hydration stations at each school site. New hydration stations are now in place at Davis School for Independent Study, King High, and Holmes Junior High. Emerson Junior High, Montgomery Elementary and Harper Junior High will see installations in the near future. Hydration stations contribute to a sustainable environment by allowing students and staff to fill reusable water bottles throughout the day and eliminate plastic water bottles from our waste.

Our first round of community outreach for this Bond Project was completed on February 26, 2020, and the Schematic Design for the project was approved by our Board of Education on June 18. This new Tech Hub at Da Vinci High will also be home to a new science lab, physical education locker rooms, a computer science lab, digital production studio, fabrication lab, and maker spaces. The computer science lab, digital production studio and fabrication lab are all contingent upon the success of a Career Technical Education (CTE) Facilities Grant, which would bring in $3 million of additional funds for this project. You can find more information and further details on our website.

DJUSD is collaborating with ARC Alternatives to provide solar power to each of our school sites. Potential solar array locations have been identified at all sites and we are currently collaborating with ARC to create a series of site-specific videos to inform our school community about proposed systems and costs. Please stay tuned for opportunities to learn more about this Bond project over the summer and into the 2020-21 school year.

• Bond Website: Find information on all things DJUSD Bond Program, including information on bond projects, presentations, bond news stories and more!
• Bond Calendar: View all of our previous and upcoming meetings about our various bond projects.
• Bond Public Outreach: Our public outreach website explains our detailed communication plan that will be followed for each bond project.
• Social Media: Follow DJUSD on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram for additional highlights and pictures of our bond projects.#DJUSDBond
• Contact us with questions or feedback at facilityplanning@djusd.net
• Invite your friends and neighbors to subscribe for this e-newsletter!