The Baltimore County school board has removed the proposed renovation of the former Catonsville Middle School from next year's capital budget request.
Instead, the board is asking for a new elementary school at the Bloomsbury Avenue site and a new gymnasium at Western School of Technology and Environmental Sciences in Catonsville.
The changes, approved at last week's board meeting, also would reduce the budget request by more than $4.2 million.
When the board approved the initial budget request in September, the school system's capital planners had not received the official enrollment statistics for this year. However, the figures showed that four of the five middle schools in the southwestern part of the county are underenrolled, while 14 of 18 elementary schools there are overcapacity. That will continue for at least five more years.
Even with proposed additions, the southwestern elementary schools would have 1,100 more students than seats in 1999 if a new elementary was not built, according to planning department estimates. The middle schools would have an extra 540 seats.
Thus, there is no need for the 1,000 additional seats at the old Catonsville Middle School, which now houses an alternative school, adult education center and several community programs.
Renovating the former middle school would have cost $14 million. The proposed elementary school, which would accommodate about 600 youngsters, would cost $7.4 million to build and equip, planners said. A new gymnasium at Western is expected to cost about $2.3 million.
More than $9 million for the Catonsville project was included in the $48 million school bond referendum approved by voters last November. The elementary school, demolition of the current Bloomsbury Avenue building and the Western gymnasium would cost only slightly more than allotted in the referendum.