EAST GRAND RAPIDS, MI - East Grand Rapids school leaders are in the design stage of a campus expansion plan that would add a new building and approximately 150,000 square feet of new space.

The proposed new building would take the place of the school’s senior parking lot, however, and the district is still working to find a solution that would provide enough parking, something the school already appears to be short on.

Anthony Morey, assistant superintendent of finance and operations for the East Grand Rapids School District, said the district believes it’s important to be transparent with its “one problem area.

“What we heard in our first focus groups from students, there’s not enough parking,” he said. “What we heard from staff members, there’s not enough parking. What we heard from community members, our partners in the city, (is) that parking is complex, that we’re in an urban environment.

“So today, we have ideas for parking, but we do not have a recommended pathway,” Morey said.

Those ideas include the construction of a multi-level parking garage on the high school campus, Morey said, something only a few schools across the nation have done so far.

“It has not been determined that that (is) the pathway that the board will pursue. That is what we have studied to be a feasible option,” Morey said, adding that the district has reserved $7 million for a parking solution.

The idea for a parking garage is still in early phases. It is not as far along as the district’s larger renovation plan to move 90% of East Grand Rapids High School instructional spaces to classrooms in a newly constructed building, sitting on top of what is now the high school’s senior parking lot.

New classrooms will be 25% larger. In addition to new classroom space, the plan also calls for approximately 40,000 square feet of renovated space.

The project is being funded by a $158.9 million, 30-year bond that passed in 2023.

Pure Architects and Owen-Ames-Kimball Co. was tapped for the project.

East Grand Rapids Superintendent Heidi Kattula said it’s been an “incredible experience to design and build the space that our kids will flourish (in), that they will be able to imagine their future and have opportunities to connect their learning in very innovative ways.”