The William S. Hart (Calif.) Union High School District is building a 468-seat performing arts center at Saugus High School in Santa Clarita.

The $14 million, 19,000-square-foot facility, dubbed "The Forum," will take about 20 months to construct, and is scheduled to be completed in 2018.

Saugus Principal Bill Bolde says the theater will be a welcome addition to the school, which opened 40 years ago.

“We have waited a long time to see this dream come to being,” Bolde says. “Saugus students representing the performing arts (band, choir, drama, and dance) have built a legacy of excellence over the past 40 years and they have done so using an undersized black box theater (multi-purpose room).”

The Forum is being built on land that now is a staff parking lot. Funding for the facility comes from a $300 million bond issue approved by voters in 2008.