By Sara Ballenger

The campus at Alta Vista High School is getting a new lease on life.

The Mountain View City Council unanimously approved a 40-year land lease at $1 per year to the Mountain View-Los Altos Union High School District, at its meeting Sept. 24.

“This is an important collaboration between the city and the school district,” said Mountain View Vice Mayor Michael Kasperzak. “This is a great opportunity, and it allows the city to relieve some of the burden from the school district.”

The empty plot of land adjacent to the district office on Bryant Street is scheduled to be the future home of Alta Vista’s campus.

“It’s a beginning,” Superintendent Rich Fischer said. “The next step is getting the formal master plan drawn, the environmental work and all of the state approvals done.”

Fischer said the district had been working toward the start of building facilities for Alta Vista for the past two years. There is a preliminary plan drawn up for the campus that is expected to cost between $4 million and $5 million, Fischer added.

“We will be using a conglomerate of funds to pay for the school,” Fischer said. “We hope to get funds through donations, a major capital fund-raising campaign and state funding. There will be no impact on property taxes.”

At first, Fischer and the school board planned to tear down the existing campus and rebuild on the same site. Moving the campus to the Bryant Avenue location will provide twice as much space and the school’s own parking lot.

The district hopes to go out for bid on the construction project this time next year, Fischer said.

“By building on raw land we can start building whenever we want and we won’t have any displaced students,” Fischer said.

Alta Vista Principal Bill Pierce sees a new campus as nothing but positive.

“The classrooms that we have now are 40-year-old portables. The students are coming into rooms that look like the district doesn’t care; and of course, that’s not the case,” Pierce said. “Walking into a classroom that matches the academic program will exponentially assist us. It will be another thing the community and district can be proud of.”