Standing on land her family once farmed, Bonnie Claiborne Harris looked out at a crowd gathered to celebrate the groundbreaking of Ridgefield’s third elementary school and saw a legacy fulfilled.
“I’m very proud and excited to say hello to you today for the Ridgefield School District Elementary #3 groundbreaking celebration,” Harris said during the June 18 groundbreaking ceremony. “Today, we celebrate the renewed property site and make way for an elementary school.”
Harris’s family has deep roots in Ridgefield. Her grandparents and parents purchased the 40-acre parcel in 1953, clearing the land by hand and with dynamite to build what became Claiborne’s Bean Farm. They grew pole beans for nearly two decades. A portion of the land was subdivided in the 1990s, but 27 acres remained until Gerald and Beverly Jones, neighbors and family friends, purchased it with the goal of one day transferring it to the Ridgefield School District.
She also has a personal connection to the district, having served as executive assistant to the superintendent for several years before her retirement in 2019.
“It’s so joyful,” she said following the groundbreaking. “I just can’t tell you how proud we are and how proud all of our family members are and how our parents would be knowing that this went to such a wonderful cause.”
Harris also shared a memory of her father.
“One thing my dad always used to say was his wealth was in his family, and that is what we’ve carried down through all of our kids,” she said. “That’s our wealth, it’s in our family.”
Superintendent Dr. Jenny Rodriquez, who took the job shortly before this year’s successful capital projects and technology levy, praised the community’s persistence after multiple failed bond attempts. Ridgefield’s third elementary school, set to open in August 2026, will accommodate 500 to 550 students. This new capacity aims to alleviate overcrowding at the two existing elementary schools.
“I’m super proud of the whole team and very excited that we can deliver,” Rodriquez told The Reflector. “Building elementary #3, it’s something the community has wanted for a really long time, and they worked really hard and found some creative ways to get here.”
Proposition No. 13, passed in February, will fund the school’s construction, repairs to other facilities and more. It is expected to raise $6.7 million in 2026, $7.1 million in 2027 and $7.4 million in 2028, with a levy rate of $0.84 per $1,000 of assessed property value. To reduce costs, the district scaled back the school’s site size from prior bond plans.
“We are grateful for the strong roots put down by Ridgefield’s founding families,” Rodriquez said. “Just as a farmer tends their fields with care... we are preparing this ground to cultivate the minds and spirits of Ridgefield’s future generations.”
Mayor Pro Tem Judy Chipman echoed the sentiment and reminded attendees that building this school was a long time coming.
“When my husband and I moved to Ridgefield in 2012, and I realized that Union Ridge was still one of only two grade schools in Ridgefield, I was absolutely shocked,” Chipman said. “So seeing that this new school is coming is just a wonderful, wonderful thing. It’s something that has been needed for a very long time.”
As golden shovels broke the ground, students joined board members to mark the start of construction. Attendees were invited to take home small jars filled with soil from Ridgefield’s two original elementary schools, Union Ridge and South Ridge, as a keepsake and a symbolic link between the past and future.
“This building may be new,” Rodriquez said, “but it is built on a strong history of support for the children of this community.”
