MARSHALLTOWN, Iowa — The Marshalltown Community School District is planning for several upgrades after voters approved the $57 million bond referendum last week.

Thirty-three school referendums were on the ballot across Iowa this year, but only 13 passed. Marshalltown residents voted to raise taxes to upgrade Miller Middle School.

“I would attribute that [bond approval] to a lot of hard work that went inti planning for about eight or nine months, engaging the community, coming up with a plan that we felt was the best for Marshalltown for today and for the future,” said Superintendent Dr. Theron Schutte.

The tax impact of the approved referendum would be an estimated $1.28 per year on every $1,000 of taxable property value. For a home with an assessed value of $200,000, this would amount to approximately $112.43 annually, or just under $10 monthly.

With this bond and funding from the state, the district will put $106 million in total to finance three parts of this project. The first, and most expensive part of the project, is renovating and expanding Miller Middle School, the 99-year-old school house in Marshalltown’s northside.

Schutte said the district has only completed about 5% of the design so far. They will continue to design the renovations and expansion over the next year, and construction is projected to begin in January 2026. In the meantime, the district will also plan how to do construction while classes are in session.

“We haven’t figured all of that out yet. I do believe that the three or four different areas of the building which will be new construction, probably can be done with kids in and staff at Miller. But we’re going to have to really think through because it’s such a significant overhaul, that there’s no way that we can pull it off just in the course of the summers,” said Schutte.

The other two parts of the project are renovating Franklin Field, which is adjacent to Miller Middle School, and adding audio/visual elements to all six elementary schools in Marshalltown.

Schutte said roughly $6 million will be put into these endeavors, while the remainder $100 million will be used for reimagining Miller Middle School. Renovations to Franklin Field and elementary school upgrades are both planned to begin this upcoming summer.