Hermiston voters approved school bond measure 30-130 in Tuesday’s election, giving the school district authority to sell $82.7 million in bonds and use the funds to increase student capacity.
Passage of the measure will also mean the district will receive $6.6 million in state funding.
The measure received 2,446 yes votes to 2,220 no votes, or 52.4 percent supporting the bond measure.
The bond measure will fund the following projects:
- Replacing Rocky Heights Elementary School with a larger 600-student building
- Constructing a new 600-student elementary school on Theater Lane
- Constructing a multi-classroom annex to increase capacity at Hermiston High School
- Purchasing property for long-term anticipated student capacity demands
Tuesday’s election comes about 30 months after the same voters rejected a $104 million bond in 2017.
“I am thankful to the Hermiston community for entrusting the school district to make this investment in our students,” said Tricia Mooney, Hermiston School District superintendent. “Our first step will be to establish a citizen oversight committee to ensure every dollar is spent the way we promised.”
The Hermiston School District will create a website to provide updates on the construction projects. Once the projects are complete, boundaries will be realigned to right-size the enrollment at each school.
Hermiston student enrollment has increased by nearly 900 students since the 2008 school bond that replaced West Park and Sunset elementary schools and built a new Armand Larive Middle School. The new elementary schools will be modeled after the ones built with the previous school bond.
