Though Jordan executive Moya Kessig emphasized that potentially shutting down a middle school has always been an option, board member Lynette Phillips said she was surprised when she learned during a Tuesday meeting that it could happen.

“At first it was, 'We can't close a middle school,' ” Phillips said Wednesday. “Then, all of a sudden, we're talking about closing one. We paid a consultant [$100,000] to study the issue and she came back and said not to close any.”

For months, district officials, board members and a 55-member committee have studied the possibility of closing several schools because of declining enrollments in the north and east areas of the state's largest district. Roughly 76,000 Salt Lake County students attend Jordan schools.

On Sept. 14, board members are expected to announce how many schools will close before the 2005-06 school year. Another committee will then recommend which specific schools to shut.

If that committee chooses to close a middle school, Phillips said it would most likely be one of three in her north-central area: Midvale, Mount Jordan or Union.

Kessig pointed out that the consultant's recommendations did not factor in the possibility that the district also could build a new middle school in Draper. If constructed, that school could handle some of the region's growth and make it easier to close one of the north-central schools.

Kessig also reminded district residents that no final decisions have been made, and that's why discussions are continuing.

"We won't know anything for sure until Sept. 14," she said. "We're just crystallizing and clarifying all the data we have."

School board members also discussed on Tuesday night the possibility of shutting two elementary schools in the district's northeast area, but then rebuilding one of them, said Craig Stark, a district executive. Rebuilding one would allow the money the district would save to remain in the neighborhood that experience the school closure, he said.

"The community felt strongly about that," Stark said. "Optimally, if a school closed, kids would get to go to school in the same area."

And, board member Ellen Wallace said the group explored closing an elementary school in the district's east-central area, which consists of Alta View, Bell View, Crescent, Edgemont, Granite, Park Lane and Willow Canyon.

District officials have said that closing two to four schools would save $18 million to $43 million by selling the properties. And it would save between $714,000 and $2 million a year in operations and maintenance costs.

Though few parents want to see their neighborhood schools disappear, doing nothing means higher taxes in coming years, board members warn. They added that operating so many schools below capacity wastes money. Taxes would have to increase even more to run 22 new schools in the district's growing areas in the west and south, board members say.

Residents approved a $281 million bond last year to build those schools by 2010.

mcronin@sltrib.com