New home buyers in 2014-15 helped the Manteca Unified School District purchase a small parcel at 419 Moffat Boulevard for the future expansion of the Manteca High campus.

Altogether school development mitigation fees collapsed into the sale price of new homes in Manteca and Lathrop generated $2,977,916 for the school district during the fiscal year ending June 30, 2015. The mitigation fees charged based on a home’s square footage is one of four ways the district has to finance new construction and remodeling. The others are local general bonds, Mello-Roos taxes, and state bond proceeds. Mitigation fees can also be tapped for growth expenditures.

The district used $14,682 of the fee revenue to purchase the parcel along Moffat behind the existing student parking. Given the cost of a high school campus — it can run as more as $100 million — the district has embarked on a long-term strategy to keep the Manteca High campus viable.

That long-term strategy may include multiple-story buildings and possibly relocating various components of the campus down the road as education needs change.

Deputy Superintendent Clark Burke has made it clear that all options are being explored while no decisions have been made.

Obtaining parcels as they become available around the development locked campus that was built in 1922 is part of a strategy to give the district as many options as possible.

Altogether, the district spent $2,520,162 from the mitigation fee account during the last fiscal year.

Money was spent toward:

uacquisition of the Tara Park elementary school site in southwest Manteca near McKinley Avenue and Woodward Avenue, $14,000.

uBrock Elliot School instructional furniture, $4,618

uLathrop High School furniture, $3,966.

uLathrop Elementary modernization, $1,321,000.

uShasta Elementary modernization, $90,219

ube.tech First Responders Academy project, $90,219.

Operating expenditures that are connected directly with growth came to $250,520.

The development fee account generated $3,349,457 last fiscal year. That included $2,977,916 in developer fees, $32,385 in interest, $14,031 in reimbursement for the Creative Child Care restroom, $50,085 transfer regarding the school farm, $100 for the sale of a Lathrop School portable, $268,686 Fund 35 transfer, and $6,242 transfer back of unspent developer fees on an ag farm project.

To contact Dennis Wyatt, email dewyatt@mantecabulletin.com