School Board Approves New 50-Meter Pool, Among $207M in Improvements
Nov 20, 2025 01:44PM ● By Dave Fratello
Photo credit: Pip Coyne.
One year after Manhattan Beach voters approved Measure RLS to repair and improve schools, decisions now have been made about where to spend $200 million in bond funds.
By a unanimous 5-0 vote, the Manhattan Beach Unified School District Board of Trustees on Wednesday night supported a package of proposals totaling $207 million. The full range of repairs, updates and new construction will touch every campus, from elementaries to the high school, even including work at Manhattan Beach Preschool.
And one big-ticket item may help answer the community's longtime call for improved aquatics facilities, as the 80-year-old Begg Pool nears the end of its useful life.
Mira Costa High School will get a new 50-meter pool, which, at $18 million, was the priciest option considered to update the existing pool on campus. Trustees said the new pool option had generated the most enthusiastic community input out of all the proposed projects.
The 50-meter option will largely occupy the same footprint as the existing pool and deck, pushing a bit to the south. Outdated locker rooms and showers will be redone. Construction is mapped out from Spring 2027 through Summer 2028, with a goal of opening for the Fall 2028 semester.
District-wide, there will be a 2-year project to improve fencing around school facilites, and over $30 million worth of enhancements for safety and security, roof repairs, HVAC improvements and replacement or repair of some older "portable" classroom buildings.
Mira Costa is also slated for a new 1-story library and a new cafeteria/kitchen. The kitchen will serve as the district's new "central kitchen," preparing all of the food for the elementaries and Costa. Currently, the "central kitchen" is a much smaller facility at the middle school, which also comes with logistical challenges for distributing food daily.
The middle school, the district's youngest facility, will see about $19 million in improvements, including replacement of carpet and cabinetry, plumbing repairs and updates to alarms for intrusions and fires, as well as updates to bells, clocks and public address systems.
Meadows will get new classrooms to replace "portable" structures now in use.
Robinson elementary will sprout a new one-story building on its lower, southern playground that will host new admin offices, a library, the lowest grades (TK, pre-K and kindergarten) and a teachers' lounge, at a cost of $13 million.
The largest elementary campus, Pacific, will see ground-up renovations to existing buildings at the northwest corner of campus (17th/Pacific), to create new classrooms for TK and EDP, with a new play area between.
Meantime, Grand View and Pennekamp, which both recently completed major new construction and renovation projects, mainly will benefit from the district-wide projects, such as security updates. Those campuses were among the greatest beneficiaries of funds from Measure C, a school facilities bond passed by Manhattan Beach voters in 2016.
As part of an extensive process before and after the election on Measure RLS (which earned 67% support in November 2024), school district officials identified needs that could exceed $488 million if all of the repairs, renovations and new buildings were to be pursued.
The process of paring back all of the wants and needs continued through the end of Wednesday's meeting, as trustees slashed $20 million from a nearly final menu of projects.
Measure RLS authorized bonds of about $200 million for school district projects by extending a levy averaging $32 per $100,000 in valuation (or $320 per million) on local homes. Previous school bonds had been paid off, but school officials asked local voters to extend the levy they were already paying, without an increase, to allow for a range of RLS projects.
An additional $7 million is available to MBUSD from builder fees and some leftover funds from a previous state bond, trustees said.
By a unanimous 5-0 vote, the Manhattan Beach Unified School District Board of Trustees on Wednesday night supported a package of proposals totaling $207 million. The full range of repairs, updates and new construction will touch every campus, from elementaries to the high school, even including work at Manhattan Beach Preschool.
And one big-ticket item may help answer the community's longtime call for improved aquatics facilities, as the 80-year-old Begg Pool nears the end of its useful life.
Mira Costa High School will get a new 50-meter pool, which, at $18 million, was the priciest option considered to update the existing pool on campus. Trustees said the new pool option had generated the most enthusiastic community input out of all the proposed projects.
Renderings of two options for the Mira Costa pool, as presented to the MBUSD trustees.
The 50-meter option will largely occupy the same footprint as the existing pool and deck, pushing a bit to the south. Outdated locker rooms and showers will be redone. Construction is mapped out from Spring 2027 through Summer 2028, with a goal of opening for the Fall 2028 semester.
District-wide, there will be a 2-year project to improve fencing around school facilites, and over $30 million worth of enhancements for safety and security, roof repairs, HVAC improvements and replacement or repair of some older "portable" classroom buildings.
Mira Costa is also slated for a new 1-story library and a new cafeteria/kitchen. The kitchen will serve as the district's new "central kitchen," preparing all of the food for the elementaries and Costa. Currently, the "central kitchen" is a much smaller facility at the middle school, which also comes with logistical challenges for distributing food daily.
The middle school, the district's youngest facility, will see about $19 million in improvements, including replacement of carpet and cabinetry, plumbing repairs and updates to alarms for intrusions and fires, as well as updates to bells, clocks and public address systems.
Meadows will get new classrooms to replace "portable" structures now in use.
Robinson elementary will sprout a new one-story building on its lower, southern playground that will host new admin offices, a library, the lowest grades (TK, pre-K and kindergarten) and a teachers' lounge, at a cost of $13 million.
The largest elementary campus, Pacific, will see ground-up renovations to existing buildings at the northwest corner of campus (17th/Pacific), to create new classrooms for TK and EDP, with a new play area between.
A diagram of new buildings for Pacific elementary, as presented to the MBUSD trustees.
As part of an extensive process before and after the election on Measure RLS (which earned 67% support in November 2024), school district officials identified needs that could exceed $488 million if all of the repairs, renovations and new buildings were to be pursued.
The process of paring back all of the wants and needs continued through the end of Wednesday's meeting, as trustees slashed $20 million from a nearly final menu of projects.
Measure RLS authorized bonds of about $200 million for school district projects by extending a levy averaging $32 per $100,000 in valuation (or $320 per million) on local homes. Previous school bonds had been paid off, but school officials asked local voters to extend the levy they were already paying, without an increase, to allow for a range of RLS projects.
An additional $7 million is available to MBUSD from builder fees and some leftover funds from a previous state bond, trustees said.
