Jun. 6—Fayette County Schools is making hay while the sun shines this summer.
As the summer break arrives, the county school system is currently involved in between $70 million and $75 million worth of building and facility improvement projects, according to Tim Payton, director of operations for the Fayette County Board of Education. Some are in the design phase, some are being worked on right now, and some will commence soon.
Work continues on Meadow Bridge Regional PK-12 School and planning continues on the new Midland Trail Elementary School in Hico. Also, an athletic/outdoor facilities upgrade pegged at more than $10 million will begin in earnest this coming week.
Below is a look at some of the activity:
—Meadow Bridge Regional PK-12 School
Phase 2 of the construction, being overseen by general contractor Swope, is about two months behind schedule. "It's always weather," Payton said.
The high school students have already moved into their wing, and work is ongoing on the elementary portion. Phase 1 experienced a delay due to switch gear for the new electrical system, according to Payton. "We don't have that issue in Phase 2."
"Our HVAC units and everything that is going on the roof are in, they're in the warehouse, they're ready to go," he added. "ICF walls are up, brick veneer is going on (probably 60 percent completed), steel roof joints are going up, decking is going on. We should be doing the roof soon. Once we can get under roof, you can make a little more progress inside.
"It's moving along. It's just that it was delayed, and weather was an issue."
Phase 2 was slated for substantial completion in December 2024, but it has been moved to February 2025. "We will not move until March of 2025. We'll make sure everything is in place, have maybe a little break in the weather. It's a good time to move."
Phase 3 features general cleanup and some demolition. According to Payton, the old elementary school will be gone, but consideration is being undertaken to retain part of that building for use for extracurricular-type activities. Civil engineers, structural engineers and architects McKinley Architects and Engineers are exploring that possibility.
Some of the classrooms in the center of the elementary building, as well as the gym, have received additional acoustic treatment. The floor plan and square footage remain the same as in the original plans.
The scope of the overall regional school project is $30 million, which includes School Building Authority of West Virginia funding and local monies.
"I'll be glad when Meadow Bridge is done," said Payton. "It's been a long project. Of course, it started with the funding before the pandemic, and that kind of threw everybody for a loop. That caused some issues and caused some prices to go up and caused some supply chain issues.
"We're still kind of paying for that, which is a credit to our board. They were committed to completing that project."
—Midland Trail Elementary
According to Payton, the schematic design phase is ongoing for the school, which will combine the student bodies of Divide and Ansted elementaries in a new facility at the Midland Trail School Complex in Hico. The school is tentatively set to feature an L-shaped, two-story building, with the primary students downstairs and the intermediate students upstairs. It will be designed to accommodate slightly more than 400 PK-5 students.
Obviously, Payton said, any pending design plans will come under the scrutiny of the SBA, FCS staff, consultants and the state fire marshal's office, among others.
"Once all that (reviews) is complete, we will bid it in the fall of 2024 (likely October or November)," he said. "So, we're looking at starting a project in the winter."
A 16- to 18-month build time is allowed, with May 1, 2026 as the deadline for substantial completion. Delays could possibly push that to June or July, he said, but "We have to be in school there in the fall of 2026."
"We have some community groups that are expressing interest in using the (Ansted and Divide) facilities, and that's always the best option," Payton said. "We like it when people can use the buildings for a purpose for the community."
Midland Trail Elementary is budgeted at slightly over $21 million, including $15 million from the SBA and $6 million in local funds via the board of education.
The school will be constructed on the site of the current Midland Trail high/middle baseball field. "Since we're taking the baseball field and the softball field area, then we need to make sure that there is a softball field and a baseball field for the students at Midland Trail High School (and middle school)." Those fields will include lights. Options are being explored for the exact location of the fields, including input from a community group, he said.
—New multi-use fields, lighting projects at Midland Trail, Oak Hill
A pre-construction meeting was scheduled for Friday at the board of education office, and "they will be mobilizing after that," said Payton.
Utilizing local funds and lease purchase funds estimated to be in the $10 million to $12 million range, the project will include synthetic, multi-use turf fields with lighting being installed at both Midland Trail and Oak Hill schools for high school and middle school. Also included will be extensive track upgrades at both schools, relocation of the current Midland Trail baseball and softball fields, and lighting for those two fields and the OHHS baseball field.
In the track situations, the Oak Hill track will have an 8-lane synthetic surface and will be renovated down to the sub-base, Payton said. The Midland Trail track has always been asphalt, and Payton said that work will include getting several lanes ready for the standard distance so practice (and possibly small meets) can occur.
At both tracks, new field events equipment will be installed. "Our plan is to have them ready by spring," Payton said of the tracks. "They may not be completely finished until later on during (2025) football season."
Hellas Construction, the winning bidder for the sports facilities project, has signed a contract pledging the football/soccer turfs will be ready for use by Aug. 16. That firm completed two Wyoming County projects last year, Payton said. "They do fields from pros to community parks."
"I just want to see the first scoop of dirt going," he said Thursday.
—Other projects
Several other projects are ongoing this summer. "We're in the process of completing HVAC renovations at FIT and Valley PK-8," said Payton. "We're taking off old equipment, putting on new equipment, updating electrical service." Switch gear was an issue, but that has been handled, he noted. Temporary power is being used in both schools, which is being taken care of by his department.
In addition, finishing touches are being placed on an outdoor classroom at Meadow Bridge, which will conclude the outdoor classroom project. Outdoor classrooms are now in place at Meadow Bridge, Valley PK-8, Oak Hill campus (three), Midland Trail and Fayetteville PK-8.
Window and door renovations are also underway. "We were able to play basketball in the gyms at Midland Trail and Oak Hill this past winter," said Payton, but some of the doors weren't the ones originally planned for those projects and will eventually be replaced.
----"I'm pleased that we are finally where we are," said Fayette County Schools Superintendent Gary Hough. "We have discussed and asked the citizens and our parents to be patient while we got these other building projects going, and it's been something they've desired for a long time.
"To be sitting in the position where we can actually deliver and do what we're doing today is a good feeling. We're going to live by what we said we would be doing: as soon as we got the building projects all under wraps and rolling, we would start to work on some of these outdoor facilities, and it's nice to know where we're at with them and that we're making progress.
"Lighting contracts are cut, construction contracts are cut, we are moving forward 100 percent."
Hough said the school system secured the remaining necessary funding for the athletic facilities projects this week through a $7.5 million lease purchase agreement. Those agreements on that portion will close on June 12, said Hough.
"This isn't the end, this is just the next step in the process," he said, adding, "Fayette County does not have the tax base that we find in other counties, and it's really hard for people to understand that issue. We've been able to do all this without a tax base which, of anything, makes me happy.
"We've been able to take some creative approaches. We've been able to maintain budgets to do what we've done, where other places have tax bases where they have very large business contributors to accomplish what they've accomplished. Fayette County has not had that resource. Counties that have that resource have not had to do what we've had to do. We've been able to do that within our budgetary means."
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