Even as they get ready to open a gleaming new Monroe High School campus and ask voters to resume operational referendum funding, School District of Monroe officials say they are serious about saving money for taxpayers.

And demonstrating that its commitment is not merely pre-referendum lip service, they said, as the district laid out a plan to study the idea of selling its Bauer Education Center downtown during its January 5 regular meeting. That facility, in a quirky former strip mall — tightly nestled between Monroe Middle School, the Brewery and the south square area — could conceivably fetch a decent price on today’s real estate market.

The effort will now include more research into the building’s market value but district officials said that generally selling the facility could generate as much as $600,000 in a sale; and from about $11,000 to $20,000 in reduced annual operating costs. 

The Board, according to Superintendent Joe Monroe, is making the effort to do “our do diligence and look at opportunities to save dollars and sell assets, if not being used.”

Still, Business Manager Ron Olson told the board the savings compared to the magnitude of financial woes the district faces are not as much as it would seem.

“It’s a one-time infusion of dollars but doesn’t really change the math,” said Olson. “This does not eliminate our problem at all. We still have the major budget problem.”

Most of the value would appear to be in the real estate — prime property in Monroe — rather than the old strip mall building. It is likely best known to the public as the long and narrow space where the board holds most of its meeting. Parking is not great, either.

Nonetheless, the place has other functions that would force the district to address some major issues if it was sold off — chief among them where the district would place students struggling with severe behavior problems of a magnitude that require them to be separated physically from other students while getting vital special assistance. That help might be and who may require seclusion and restraint.

The district would have to find a way to separate those students with no access to other student areas for safety reasons, official said, which is less preferable than having them in a separate building entirely. At the elementary level, for example, that includes extremely disruptive students who are perhaps engaged in “hitting, kicking and scratching,” at school.

Currently the number of students the building serves there varies at any given time range from almost zero to as many as five to six students of all ages, said Joe Monroe.

The board agreed only to study the idea in depth, including finding more data on market value, operating costs; and the real costs and capabilities they would need to replace Bauer.