The Desert Sands Unified School District has asked the city of Indio for $2.25 million to help move and install portable classrooms to house students while Indio High School is being rebuilt.

The district has also asked to use the site of the future city library in which to house 40 portable classrooms during the construction, expected to begin in 2011 and take about 41/2

City and school district officials are expected to meet some time before the new plans for Indio High School go to the school board on Nov. 17 for approval. They will then bring back a proposal to the City Council for approval, said Mark Wasserman, assistant to the city manager.

“At this point right now, we will meet with (the district) and figure out if we can come up with the funds to assist them on this concept,” he said.

During the Indio City Council meeting on Nov. 4, city and school district officials made a presentation of the latest designs for the $83 million reconstruction of the city's 51-year- old school.

The district is expected to pay for the construction with bonds and Measure K funds, a $450 million bond measure passed by voters in 2001.

However, the school district needs an additional $4.5 million to put up the portables for students during construction and officials hope to split the cost with the city of Indio, said Peggy Reyes, the school district's facilities director.

“We basically wanted to split the increased cost with them because they asked us to make the changes that we made to our original plan,” Reyes said.

City officials had asked the school district to go back to the drawing board on the high school's design after the school board approved it in June.

The original plan had the main entrance of Indio High School off Clinton Street. It did not fit in with the city's plans for an intergenerational campus that has various services for teens and seniors all in walking distance.

“The city spent millions of dollars building this intergenerational campus that includes the new senior and teen centers,” Wasserman said. “Desert Sands graciously agreed to work with us to make the new Indio High School campus try to fit it in with the intergenerational campus.”

The school district's new plans presented Nov. 4 to the council has the main entrance of Indio High School facing Avenue 46, across the street from the Indio Teen Center. The Indio City Council applauded that plan.

“We need to have a state-of-the-art high school that would be the center of the city,” Mayor Melanie Fesmire said.

When construction begins and classroom buildings are torn down, the school district will need to move 40 percent of the high school students to portables on the city-owned land next to the school, Reyes said.

The portables will come from various locations, including Indio High School, Kennedy and Lincoln elementary schools, and a future elementary school site on Youngs Lane, Reyes said.

“As we build new classrooms and tear others down, then teachers and students would be moving in and out the portables,” she said.

Indio High School Principal Rudy Ramirez said the inconvenience of having portable classrooms for three years is a good investment.

“When you consider the big picture of building a totally new Indio High School, it is exciting and that is what I am thinking about,” he said.