Waukee Schools to Build Seventh Elementary School

Save for a giant cell phone tower, the corner of South 95^th Street and Stagecoach Drive in West Des Moines looks rather pastoral. Rolling hills, few trees and a grassy prairie make it look almost deserted.

But the Waukee School District and the Waukee Board of Education are taking steps to change that. In a meeting held Tuesday night, board members unanimously approved a $760,000 land purchase of 18.23 acres at that intersection in the Michael’s Landing development. It will be home to a new elementary school, its seventh in the district.

The purchase is a step toward not only accommodating an ever-growing school district, but also to revitalizing an area that to some, has seen better days.

“This new school will do wonderful things for that area down there,” said Waukee School Superintendent Dave Wilkerson of the Michael’s Landing area. “It’s been stagnant and in disrepair and just waiting to be healed up. With a school going in, I would predict a lot of activity there a year from now.”

Wilkerson isn’t saying things that haven’t been said before. There’s been much discussion about what should happen to the 347-acre development that stalled out in 2008 when Regency Homes, the area’s developer, went bankrupt. Only a smattering of homes went up before Regency Homes left the project.

Mason McKinnie lives on South 95^th Street in Michael’s Landing. He said news of the new elementary school was a bright spot in an otherwise dreary outlook for the neighborhood.

“We’re really excited to see growth and movement around here,” he said. “We bought our house in 2008 just three weeks before Regency went under. There hasn’t been a lot of good happening out here since.”

McKinnie believes many of the development’s homeowners would approve of the new school being built there. He said the neighborhood houses a lot of young families who have school age children who will attend the elementary school.

Wilkerson agrees. He said because of the tremendous growth in the Waukee School District, a seventh elementary school was necessary.

“Next year, all our elementaries will be full,” he said. “I refuse to call it a problem. It’s a challenge and an opportunity."

Wilkerson said the district will close on the property by the first week in September with construction beginning in early 2012, as soon as the weather permits.

Construction will be conclude by the start of the 2013-2014 school year. When completed, the school will be Waukee’s third elementary school in West Des Moines along with Maple Grove and Brookview Elementaries.