Big contracts keep education hopping

Journal of Business, Mar 08, 2007 by Crompton, Kim

Work on the first phase, which includes all the athletic facilities, is expected to wrap up this summer, Brown says.

The school district expects the project to be substantially completed by late next year, but some additional work-including the demolition of some older annex buildings-probably won't be completed until May or June of 2009, he says.

On Spokane's South Hill, Levernier Construction Inc., of Spokane, is wrapping up work on a $10.3 million gymnasium and fitness center at Ferris High School, at 3020 E. 37th, with a grand opening slated for April 9.

The new gymnasium complex will include a main-events gym, a practice gym, a weight room, and an aerobics room, as well as other fitness rooms. It's being built just south of the school's current 48,000-square-foot gym at the southeast corner of the campus. NAC/Architecture designed the structure.

In Spokane Valley, Garco mostly has completed three phases of a fourphase, $29 million expansion and remodeling project at West Valley High School, that got under way in the fall of 2005. Remaining work is scheduled to be completed by late August, says Peggy Cannon, assistant to West Valley School District projects manager Dave Smith.

Overall, the project will add about 80,000 square feet of floor space to the school, located at 8301 E. Buckeye, giving it a total of about 210,000 square feet. Initial work focused on construction of a 55,000-square-foot gymnasium and events facility north of the main school building.

Some of the work yet to be completed includes construction of a new student commons area, cafeteria, and additional classrooms, Cannon says. The final phase of work also will include connecting the high school's northern athletic wing to its southern academic wing, she says.

Using $11 million in proceeds from the same bond issue used to fund the high school work, the district expects to seek bids shortly for the construction of new gymnasiums and additional classrooms at each of its four elementary schools, she says. Those schools are Pasadena Park, Ness, Orchard Center, and Seth Woodard.

The district hopes to start site work on those projects in April, with them all going on simultaneously, and to complete them in the spring of 2008, Cannon says. NAC/Architecture is the architect on those projects, she says.

Additionally, the school district plans to make about $2.5 million worth of improvements this summer at North Central High School, at 1600 N. Howard, including mechanical-system, lighting, and other upgrades, Brown says.

The mechanical-or heating, ventilation, and air-conditioning-system improvements represent the last phase of about $6.5 million worth of that type of work done at North Central over the last two years, he says. Project bids for that work came in far enough below estimates that the district has enough money left over to re-carpet the entire school, which also will be done this year, he says. It earlier replaced much of the school's roof and constructed new tennis courts with some of that untapped money, he says.