CANFIELD — Voters said no to the 6.9-mill, $107.8 million bond issue the Canfield Board of Education put on the ballot Tuesday to build a new school campus on the 100-acre Red Gate farm property in Canfield Township.

Unofficial results had the bond issue defeated by nearly 72 percent of the vote.

The school district’s plan was to raise $107.8 million over 37 years through a bond issue that would be used to build a pre-K to grade 8 building. Its location would be on the farm property owned by the city at the intersection of South Palmyra and Leffingwell roads in Canfield Township. They would also allocate $20 million for renovations to the existing high school.

The 100-acre Red Gate site is 2.5 miles southwest of the center of Canfield.

In the process, the school district would have no longer used its Hilltop Elementary, C.H. Campbell Elementary and Canfield Village Middle school buildings. There is money in the project to abate/demolish each property but the school board has yet to make a final decision.

School officials have said they are considering placing the 6.9-mill bond issue on a special election ballot in August,

Joe Knoll, Canfield Schools superintendent, said of the voting results: “Today, our district stands at a crossroads. We respect the community’s decision and will continue to serve our students with wholehearted commitment.”

He said the Canfield Local Schools “are facing significant challenges this year and in the coming years with roofing repairs and several other infrastructure problems.”

He added, “As we face these challenges, we will have to make difficult decisions. However, we will continue to focus on meeting the educational needs of our students.”

Knoll noted that there were numerous school issues on the ballot across Ohio in this election and that “Ohio schools depend on these levies or bonds as an essential funding stream.”

The school district would have executed a land swap with the city, in which the city would give the school district the Red Gate property in exchange for the Canfield Village Middle School building, all of the parking off of Wadsworth Street and the Canfield Board of Education bus garage. The Canfield Village Middle School building is on 9.1 acres. In the land exchange, the city would decide what to do with these properties.

Jenifer Studer, who was leaving the MetroParks farm about the time the polls closed Tuesday, said she voted for the levy because she is a teacher herself.

“I’m a teacher. I vote for every levy and issue,” she said. But she had to think a bit about what she would do this time, she said.

“That is a lot of money at the same time,” she said of the bond issue. She teaches in the Howland Local Schools.

She said she understands that Canfield does not get a lot of money from the state for construction projects. “It’s hard when the state doesn’t give you anything,” she said.

Under the school district’s plan, the state would have paid 9.3 percent of the project — about $10 million. Canfield school district residents would have paid the rest.

Knoll has said the Redgate property could some day house a new high school as well, bringing all of the schools onto one campus.

Knoll has said $85,274,483 of the funds would have gone toward the new elementary-middle school building. The high school would have seen $20 million in renovations.

The plan called for the new pre-K to grade 8 building to be divided into two pods, keeping the younger and older students apart most of the time, officials have said.

The Ohio Facilities Construction Commission analyzed each of the school district’s four buildings and advised that renovation of the four existing buildings instead of the current plan would cost $32.3 million at the high school, $12.3 million at Hilltop, $13.5 at C.H. Campbell and $32.2 million at the middle school, the web site states.

The bond issue plan included $20 million in renovations to the high school, which would extend its use for at least 25 years, the web site states.

erunyan@vindy.com