JOPLIN, Mo. — Plans to close some streets near the proposed Joplin High School drew questions, including a challenge from a former Joplin mayor, during a public hearing this week.

Sections of Iowa, Missouri, Ohio and Minnesota avenues would be closed permanently under the plan, as would 24th Street from one lot west of Indiana Avenue to Grand Avenue.

About 15 residents attended the public hearing sponsored by the Joplin School District. Some said they were not opposed to the changes, and others expressed concerns about the possibility of increased traffic being filtered to 26th Street and nearby residential streets such as Kentucky Avenue if 24th Street is closed.

Charlotte Duke, 2528 S. Ohio Ave., said she was concerned about being able to travel east if the roads were closed and about the impact the closings would have on traffic near her home.

“I live on Ohio,” Duke said. “I cannot get out to go east. How am I going to go east? Any time at 7, 8 (a.m.), 3, 4, 5 p.m., you cannot go east out of my street when there’s school. Since the tornado, it’s been a little easier. But still, the traffic is backed up.”

The proposal also calls for Missouri Avenue to end in a cul-de-sac just south of 24th Street, and for Ohio, Minnesota and Iowa avenues to be connected by a through street south of the current 24th Street along the new southern boundary of the high school.

Former Mayor Phil Stinnett, who does not reside in the area that would be affected by the closures, suggested that 24th Street be rerouted on a curve so residents could still use it as a through street. He made it clear that he was speaking only as a Joplin taxpayer, and not as a representative of the city government.

“You’ve kind of got the cart before the horse because any street improvements outside of your boundaries are going to be paid for by me as a taxpayer, not by you as a school district,” he said. “The City Council is the one that makes a decision on all of these streets. You’re backing them into a corner. If you step back from 24th Street and leave it open, I think you solve a whole lot of other problems that you’re going to create, and a lot of us are going to be opposed to what you’re doing, not only streets but your bond issue also.”

The meeting was led by Paul Barr, financial officer for the district, and several of the district’s subcontractors. One subcontractor, C. Jay Wynn, owner of CJW Transportation Consultants, will conduct a traffic study of the area once the site plan is laid out.

“We heard good comments,” Wynn said after the meeting. “Some of them just want answers we don’t have yet.”

Barr said the funds for the connecting street and cul-de-sac would come from the high school projects budget, which the district has put at $104 million. The new high school, to replace the one destroyed on May 22, is part of a $62 million bond issue the board has voted to put before voters in April.

Suggestions from the meeting will be given to the city for discussion. The request for street closures is to be considered by the Joplin Planning and Zoning Commission at 4 p.m. Monday at City Hall, 602 S. Main St., and then will go to the City Council for final consideration.

School Superintendent C.J. Huff said previously that district officials want to work to “maintain the integrity of the neighborhoods, and provide access and hopefully safer streets in the end as we talk abut the potential of cul-de-sacs and things of that nature. That could be considered an improvement in some ways.”

The school district has acquired nearly 80 properties to the south and west of the tornado-destroyed high school and Franklin Technology Center, which will be combined into one building. The location of the high school had to be moved, officials said, so the district could be eligible for millions of dollars in federal funds that it would not otherwise receive if the high school were rebuilt on the same site, which is in a flood plain. The high school was built more than 50 years ago and was not in a flood plain at the time, but revisions of federal flood plain maps changed the status.

Streets that the school district is requesting be closed are:

• Iowa Avenue, from 20th Street to three lots south of 24th Street.

• Missouri Avenue, from 22nd Street to one lot south of 24th Street.

• 24th Street, from one lot west of Indiana Avenue to Grand Avenue.

• Ohio Avenue, from 24th Street three lots to the south.

• Minnesota Avenue, from 24th Street three lots to the south.

• All existing roadways, alleys and utility easements in the area north of 24th Street, east of Grand Avenue, south of 20th Street and west of Indiana Avenue.





Building plan



JOPLIN SCHOOL OFFICIALS have said they hope to break ground for a new high school this spring, with students to move in for the start of the 2014-15 school year.