Students, staff and community members gathered at Loretto Elementary in Jacksonville on Thursday to break ground on a new classroom addition that will finally retire 13 portable classrooms and two aging pod buildings from the campus. The $12.3 million project is set to open in 2028 and will bring 15 new classrooms, including primary and intermediate learning spaces, a dedicated music classroom and a teacher planning room.
According to Duval County Public Schools, the project is funded through the voter-approved half-cent sales tax and reflects a commitment to creating modern, high-quality learning environments for Team Duval students. The new addition will also expand the campus's parent drop-off loop with additional vehicle stacking lanes, a change aimed at addressing traffic issues around the campus, as reported by First Coast News.
A Campus With Roots Dating to 1893
Loretto Elementary currently enrolls 875 students for the 2026–2027 school year and has held an “A” state academic performance grade since the 2024–2025 school year, per the same First Coast News report. That track record comes despite a campus layout that has long leaned on temporary classroom structures to handle enrollment.
The school's history stretches back to 1893, according to historical archives published by UNF Digital Commons and local reporting by 104.5 WOKV. A 2019 proposal sought to preserve Loretto as a historic school, while the current project will remove later-added pod buildings.
Funding Traces Back to a 2020 Ballot Measure
The money behind Loretto's new wing traces to a ballot measure Duval County voters approved in November 2020: a 15-year half-cent sales surtax designed to fund a $1 billion Master Facility Plan for deferred maintenance and modernization across the district, according to Duval County Public Schools. That same surtax has already financed new replacement campuses for Southside Estates Elementary and Jean Ribault High School, both completed in August 2025, along with a $61 million overhaul at Fletcher High School, per district progress reports and prior Hoodline coverage.
The surtax also supports access-controlled door upgrades and perimeter fencing.
New Buildings Rising Amid an Operating Budget Squeeze
The district revised its Master Facilities Plan and Five-Year Capital Plan in October 2024 under Superintendent Dr. Christopher Bernier, re-sequencing projects to account for post-pandemic construction cost inflation and updated charter school revenue-sharing requirements, according to Duval County Public Schools. That recalibration helps explain why a project like Loretto's can still break ground even as the district's finances look strained elsewhere.
Hoodline reported last month that DCPS was projected to face a $100 million budget deficit before the 2026–2027 school year as districtwide enrollment fell below 100,000 students, but district leaders balanced the books before the year began. State law strictly limits half-cent sales tax funds to capital construction rather than operating costs like teacher salaries, which is why new classrooms can rise at Loretto even as the district grapples with staffing cuts elsewhere.
That legal separation also explains why physical upgrades haven't always kept pace with day-to-day building maintenance. Hoodline reported in August that Loretto classrooms suffered air conditioning failures during high-heat advisories, drawing parent complaints and underscoring the campus's lingering infrastructure strain ahead of Thursday's groundbreaking.
