CABARRUS COUNTY, N.C. — Cabarrus County Board of Education unanimously passed a motion that will allow the school system to fund and begin construction for the $2.6 million Northwest Cabarrus High School gymnasium addition without asking the county commissioners for additional funding for it.
The board passed this item during its business meeting on Monday, and by approving it, the board withdrew its request from last week’s meeting, to ask the county for up to $500,000 in additional funding.
This week, Len Witke, executive director of facilities management for the school system, presented the board with a plan that would allow the system to use funds from other Qualified School Construction Bonds (QSCB) projects to fund this one.
One of those projects is the Mount Pleasant Middle School cooling tower replacement project. Witke told the board Monday that the bid for the cooling tower came in too high, and members unanimously approved to postpone that project, which was budgeted for $50,000.
The other projects that will be postponed are the $133,500 Concord High School vocational education building remodel; the $56,470 boilers replacement project at Mount Pleasant High School; the $540,400 Northwest Cabarrus High practice fields; and the $305,956 Beverly Hills Elementary School chiller and controls replacement project.
These are in addition to the approximately $1.6 million of QSCB funding that was originally set aside for the Northwest Cabarrus High gymnasium addition.
The project’s scope changed months ago, due to code reviews and an accident last year in Lenoir, where a wrestler was left paralyzed because the area for the match did not meet state guidelines.
The school board has discussed the gymnasium project several times over the last few months, planning to ask the county commissioners in February for $1.9 million when the revised scope of the project was estimated to be about $4 million.
Witke said last week that the project had been changed again because the board had been concerned about the cost. The school system had asked the architects to look at other options to reduce the cost, which is now about $2.6 million.
The project involves removing the current bleachers in the gymnasium, lowering the floors below the bleachers and reinstalling the bleachers at the level of the gymnasium floor. This would allow a greater opportunity for educational classes and cross-court play in that area, while also increasing the total seating and allowing for handicapped seating, Witke said last week.
As it has discussed the addition, the board agreed this project needed to go ahead for several reasons, including the safety issues and to provide more educational opportunities in the gymnasium. They listed these reasons again this week.
“I think we’re all in agreement there’s a safety factor at the gym currently,” said board member Carolyn Carpenter. “We would like to have done the fields (at the school), but the gym is a priority. … We’ve found a way now we can do (the gymnasium project) without having to go and ask for more money.”
Board member Cindy Fertenbaugh asked if there was still money for the design for the practice fields at Northwest Cabarrus High, and Witke said there was.
Fertenbaugh said that Witke had previously indicated that there were community organizations that might work on the fields as a special project, but the design needs to be completed first. Because the money is still available for that, Fertenbaugh said she supported the proposal.
As for the other projects that have been postponed, the board voted on Monday to add these projects to a resolution asking the state for additional QSCB funds.
Witke said the state has told school districts that there is about $12.5 million available from the original QSCB funds that were reverted because they were not used.
School systems have until Friday to request additional QSCB funds but must first have approval from their local governing bodies.
The school board discussed its resolution asking the state for almost $12 million in these funds, since Witke said the system was told to ask for as much as it needed.
Attached to the resolution was a document with projects that included technology improvements at schools; a land purchase for a future elementary school in the northwest area of the county; energy improvements; repairs to tennis courts and parking lots at several high schools; and the addition of an emergency generator so Mount Pleasant High can serve as an emergency shelter during a crisis.
After discussing whether or not the county commissioners would approve it, the board decided it should at least ask for the funds.
Fertenbaugh made a motion to approve the funding request with several modifications. The modifications were to add back in the projects that were originally planned to be completed in the first round of QSCB funding and were postponed; to remove energy improvements and any projects that involved repairs to parking lots or tennis courts; to reduce technology requests to only include those for middle schools and the Glenn Center; and to put the land purchase for the future school at the bottom of the funding request list.
The board approved this unanimously.
WSOC
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