Philly pushes pause — again — in decisions about the future of its school buildings

The Philadelphia School District is pausing its facilities planning process, Superintendent Tony B. Watlington Sr. said Thursday — stalling yet again long-term decisions about the fate of the school system’s large stock of aging buildings.

Watlington, who came to Philadelphia in June, said he first wanted to develop a “five-year, aggressive strategic plan” focused on academics before turning to the state of the district’s buildings. Priorities for the academic plan should and will drive needs of the facilities document, the superintendent said in remarks to the school board Thursday night.

Philadelphia’s last comprehensive look at its facilities needs came in 2017, when it estimated unmet capital needs of about $5 billion. The school system has been losing students since then. Officials first announced a “Comprehensive School Planning Review” — with a $1.4 million budget — in 2019, but there were concerns about the efficacy of the process, and ultimately, the pandemic scuttled it.

In April, then-Superintendent William R. Hite Jr. announced a restart to the planning process, raising the idea that school consolidations, closings, and new buildings were all on the table as the district took a hard look at its future needs. The school board had allocated another $1.3 million for that process.

But Watlington said building decisions will need to follow academic priorities, even if that means another pause on what had been promised to the public. Necessary repairs and projects underway will still happen, he said.

Examples of academic decisions that might drive “how we build schools, how we renovate schools,” Watlington said, include what the district determines are priorities around career and technical education, the need for modern science labs, and considerations around class size.

Also, “I am certain that one AP course in a high school is something that we’ll want to change,” Watlington said. “We’ll want to have a baseline standard, for all of our children can expect to have x number of AP courses in every school, if we are serious about increasing rigor.”

The strategic planning process for academic goals is now underway and a final strategic plan is expected to be approved by the board in June. Facilities planning, presumably, will begin sometime after then.

The delay raises the possibility of further community frustration. Earlier this year, for instance, the board rejected a plan to spend $10 million renovating the pool at Sayre High School, saying while it may be a worthy community project, officials were reluctant to commit to any such effort without a full sense of needs city- and district-wide.

Board member Reginald Streater said he supported the pause — the district must get such consequential decisions right.

“I totally understand while you’re pumping the brakes,” Streater said.

The board also heard a plea for improved school safety from a handful of community members, including Antoine Little, father of two children who attend T.M. Peirce Elementary and one who attends Dobbins High in North Philadelphia.

Dobbins is experiencing significant safety and school culture problems, with frequent fights, intruders, rampant marijuana smoking, staff and student assaults, and few consequences for those who act out, even seriously.

Watlington has said safety is his number one priority, but Little said he’s fed up with promises.

“I have zero faith in this school district. This is the same soup, just warmed over. When you have safety issues that are going on in these schools, they need to be addressed, and they need to be addressed immediately,” Little said.

The superintendent said he understood.

“I want you to know, we hear you loud and clear and we will be very focused on those issues,” Watlington said.

Prior to the meeting, district leaders for safety, climate and culture, and schools told The Inquirer they had planned with Dobbins staff prior to the school year for increased student needs, and would continue to pivot and add resources.

But, Chief of Schools Evelyn Nuñez said, “across the nation, we are seeing an increase of student misbehaviors and violence. It’s not unique to Dobbins, it’s not unique to the School District of Philadelphia.”

Dobbins will receive three additional school safety officers, safety chief Kevin Bethel said, bringing its total count of officers to eight.

“More adults have to be in the building now,” Bethel said.