This Monday, August 1, 2022, the School Board for Hoover City Schools will vote whether to move forward with plans to build a Performing Arts Center at Hoover High School. While our highly competitive athletics program has long had many fields, courts, and gyms that are appropriate in which to practice and play their games, our current State Champion band, and award winning choir, dance and theater programs have had to find other places in the community to perform because the theater was built so small it cannot accommodate the audiences and the performing students. Our Symphonic Winds band is pictured in the performance hall at Samford University with acoustics befitting their talent and skill. Most of the time, they perform in a basketball gym at the school along with the other three concert bands. These are very different experiences for the audience and students.

For choir performances, Hoover's eight choirs must find local churches willing to let them perform in their facilities and dance and drama students have a thimble of a theater to work with and sets are limited due to the minuscule size of the stage.

Last year, in a rare opportunity, bond money became available for HCS to be used within three years and the School Board voted to use it for a Performing Arts Center for HHS and for upgrades for the Spain Park theater. Because the bids for the PAC at HHS came in approximately $5 million higher than allotted, this project is in jeopardy of being cut and the money used in other places.

Almost 30 years ago when Hoover High School was built, the theater was an afterthought and was too small for the programs even then. Performing arts students made up a large number of the student population, yet they were not given the kind of facilities that a school of the caliber of Hoover High School would be expected to offer. That stands even truer today.

The School Board needs to see that this multi-million dollar project is important to the parents and the Hoover community for them to justify this expenditure which will require other projects to wait longer to be built or upgraded if the PAC is funded. Performing arts students have been waiting almost 30 years and now THIS is their time. We know the board doesn't intend to make the band, choir and theater students feel less served than the athletic students, but this is indeed happening. Students, directors and parents are frustrated year after year with the lack of facilities dedicated to student performances. Other much smaller systems in the state have much larger performing facilities than Hoover.

Please sign this petition to show the Hoover City Schools School Board that you support the funding for the Performing Arts Center at Hoover High School. Because this bond money has to be used within three years and we are almost a year into that time period, this is a special situation that may not ever present itself again. The time is NOW...now or most likely never, to have a Performing Arts facility that these award winning, nationally known programs deserve.

Not only are we asking you to sign this petition asap, we also invite you to come in person to show your support to the School Board meeting Monday, August 1, 2022 at 1:00pm at the Central Office to show your support in person. It's now or (most likely) never. Thank you for your support of the arts at Hoover High School.