Bellwood-Antis school board officials decided yesterday that a vote is needed to go ahead with plans to put $1.3 million worth of renovations into the school auditorium.
At the school board work session meeting held yesterday, the board heard once again from Rick Witt, an architect from L.R. Kimball & Associates Inc., who outlined the new additions to the plan, which has grown from a $554,242.50 project in November to a $1.3 million plan here in February.
“As the project has grown in scale, it has also grown in complexity,” said Witt at the December meeting. “As we walked through the auditorium, we noted the additions needed to be completed to make the area safer. This drove up the costs.”
According to the district superintendent, Rodney Kuhns, board members inspected the area and decided that simple renovations weren’t the only things needed to bring the auditorium to a safe standard. The information gathered was then submitted to Witt, who in turn, inspected the area again and proposed the revised cost estimate to the board.
Officials were hoping for a cost estimate to be presented at the January meeting, but Kuhns said Witt was not fully prepared with all the numbers necessary for a vote.
Now, according to the board’s Vice-President Donna Tyler, the budget is resting at $1,333,343.
“There were no problems from any of the board members concerning this decision,” said Tyler this morning. “It’s a necessary project that we want to see get going as soon as possible.”
According to Kuhns, the $1,333,343 estimate is not set in stone.
“Now that number is a little high and we’re expecting that a good number of items in the projected budget will come in under what’s outlined here,” said Kuhns.
According to Witt, changes to the preliminary plan included adding new doors at the rear of the facility, adding new technology to both the stage and auditorium areas, removal of asbestos from the stage area, and new construction and developing layout plans for general lighting and sound.
Board members have also said the auditorium is in dire need of a new rigging system. The current system was designed and built in the 1930s and is a fixture in the building. Officials hope a new, mobile rigging fixture would allow stage crews to change stage lighting and hanging props without using a ladder.
The project is being funded through monies secured from a $2 million bond that was floated earlier this year, said Kuhns. He noted the large expenditure does not affect tax payers because the bond was acquired at such a low-interest rate.
Nearly a quarter of that bond amount has already been spent on property purchased and another $119,000 of that funding is pending for other purposes – leaving a balance of about $1.39 million.
Tyler said the board is expected to adopt a preliminary budget at the next meeting, scheduled for Jan. 11 in the cafeteria of the middle/high school.
“This budget, of course, will be tentative,” said Kuhns. “As I stated earlier, I would hope that it’s finished under budget, but there are so many things we have to put a price on now to get the project going, that may change when it comes time to begin the project.”
According to Kuhns, if the board adopts the tentative budget next week, further planning can be done and the bids can go out as early as July. He hopes the work could be completed in the summer when students are not in classes.
In other business, the board discussed the green space area between the high school and Myers Elementary School. This is an all-purpose field used by a number of different extra-curricular groups and standard classrooms.
Officials have discovered that over the years, wear and tear on the field from use, parking and weather, has made the field unsafe for kids to be utilizing.
Discussions over the last few months amongst board members centered on how best to take care of the problem – some want to hire professional help, while others would like to see the board use local resources.
Tyler said at last evening’s meeting, officials decided to have a few people and organizations, at no cost, assess the property and develop a plan of needed work that’s required to make the green space safe again. A report should be offered at the March meeting, said Tyler.
