By Charla Wurm
cwurm@wbcowqel.com
With three of the four school demolition projects completed, the Colonel Crawford Board of Education turned its sight toward the construction of the district’s Central Office.
Colonel Crawford has been moving right along with the abatements on the old school buildings but one of the biggest steps is getting the Central Office up and running at the current high school.
“Much of the meeting tonight was passing urgent necessity resolution so we could get started on Central Office,” said Superintendent Todd Martin. “We have to get that piece done ahead of the rest of the project so we can get payroll and get all the computers everything done, the computer line drops, etc. so we can still function as a Central Office.”
Martin said they will be taking an existing classroom located on the outside of the gym and turn it into the treasurer’s and superintendent’s office. A meeting room will also be outfitted from the old classroom. The area off the gymnasium with the accordion doors will be turned into two offices for the secretaries of the treasurer and the superintendent.
The school board also received bids from local contractors for various work on the project. Studer Electric, Inc. will be doing the electrical work while Kinn Brothers, Inc. received the bid for some of the mechanical work. J&F Construction will be working on general trades and improvements.
Martin was very enthusiastic about the project and said it should be completed by June of 2015 at an estimated cost of $52,000 for four offices.
As far as the bidding process for the demolition for a portion of the current high school building, there were six bids that came in under budget. The state would allow $3.28 million dollars for the project. Two of the lowest local bidders came in at $570,000 under budget. That was between J&F Construction and Studer Obringer. There will be a sit down meeting on January 6 to go over the contract to make sure what is covered in the bid.
The PTO had its new computers ready to use at the meeting and thanked the school board for the additional help they needed to make the purchase. Now the students will be able to use them for State testing and to help further their education.