On Monday, the San Marcos CISD board of trustees moved closer to choosing the site of the district’s seventh elementary school campus, which will be built using $30.5 million from the $107.3 million bond approved in May.

Perkins + Will, the district’s bond consultant, narrowed the list of potential sites for the new campus from five possibilities to two. The district is considering a 15-acre site at La Cima, a planned neighborhood that is beginning construction near Wonder World Drive and Old RR 12, and a 12-acre site near Trace, another neighborhood that recently began construction near Posey Road and I-35.

Perkins + Will’s timeline for the project calls for surveying and engineering work to begin this summer, and the consultant requested the board choose a site by mid-June. The board’s next regularly scheduled meeting is June 19.

The new school will help relieve current and anticipated capacity issues at the district’s elementary schools. Mendez, Travis and Crockett elementary schools are at or over capacity, and Hernandez Elementary School is nearly at capacity, according to a report given by Templeton Demographics.

The Hernandez Elementary attendance zone, which includes Cottonwood Creek, Vista de Los Santos and other areas in the southwest portion of the city, is seeing the most home closings, Templeton Demographics President Bob Templeton said. There are more than 75 closings in the Hernandez attendance zone annually. The Bowie Elementary School attendance zone was the second fastest-growing, with 25-75 closings per year. Bowie and Travis followed with 1 and 25 closings per year.

New developments within the Hernandez attendance zone, including the Retreat at Willow Creek and the Village at Willow Creek signal future growth, Templeton said.

“Your housing market is about to really kick it up into a higher gear,” he said.

According to an initial timeline distributed at the meeting Monday, construction on the new campus will not begin until summer 2018. Trustee John McGlothlin asked if there was any way to begin construction sooner so as to more quickly address crowding at the existing elementary campuses.



Trustee Miguel Arredondo said he wanted to renew conversations about portable buildings because the new elementary construction and other planned renovations at the district’s elementary schools are years away.

“Right now our projected elementary school date and renovations are going to be mid-2019 or close to 2020,” Arredondo said. “Obviously we’re going to have to address overcrowding before 2019.”