DPSCD asks foundation to fund Cooley athletic fields, high school redesign and Camp Shirley repairs

District staff briefed the finance committee on a set of philanthropic focus areas they want the DPSCD Foundation to prioritize, emphasizing larger-scale capital and program needs rather than small grants.

The briefing matters because it signals which capital and program priorities the district will ask private funders to support and identifies specific funding gaps and operating-cost needs that would otherwise fall to district budgets.

A staff member told the committee that the district has realigned the foundation to drive fundraising toward district priorities. "We are now telling the foundation these are our priorities philanthropically and asking them to fundraise on our behalf rather than thinking about small grants," staff said.

Key items and the funding asks discussed in the meeting transcript included:

- Cooley athletic complex: staff described a revised, scaled plan and said the state provided $50,000,000 toward demolition and architectural work. The district’s current philanthropic gap for constructing the fields and an indoor facility was described as about $10,000,000. The revised plan focuses on outdoor fields, bleachers and an indoor facility for weight training, locker rooms and a space to memorialize Cooley’s history; a larger build-out was left possible for the future.

- High school redesign: staff identified a $5,000,000 one-time development request to redesign high-school schedules, build university partnerships and align college/workforce pathways. The meeting noted recurring costs such as transportation and tuition would require ongoing funding beyond the one-time ask.

- Camp Shirley (referred in the transcript as "Camper Shirley"): staff said the district owns the property and that the facility deteriorated during the pandemic. A minimum $2,700,000 investment was described as required to make the camp usable for daytime and summer programming; a full modernization was described as a more ambitious $40,000,000 project. Annual operating costs if reopened were estimated at about $350,000.

- Family resource centers and health hubs: staff asked for $360,000 a year to supply family resource centers, and $1.1 million to continue operating health hubs after existing grant funding (a Ballmer grant) expires in roughly a year and a half.

Board members pressed staff on grant history and partnerships. One board member asked whether a foundation grant application had been filed for Camp Shirley; staff said they did not recall an application through the foundation. Board members suggested exploring state legislative appropriations and regional partnerships to support Camp Shirley, and discussed whether Title I or other federal funds might be used for programmatic costs (but not for capital repairs such as plumbing and cabins).

Staff and a board member agreed to follow up on outstanding grant applications, potential intergovernmental partnerships and fundraising strategy. The committee did not vote on any of the philanthropic asks in this meeting; staff requested the committee’s feedback and will provide next steps to the foundation.