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District officials report multiple classroom additions on budget, give timelines for bids and construction
Summary
Architects and district project managers updated the board on schematic designs and budgets for several classroom additions, saying most are within current budgets and targeting construction bids and one-year build times.
Dustin De Jong, director of design at Building Architecture, told the School Board Capital Outlay Committee the schematic design for the new classroom building at the Independence Leadership Academy has been submitted and is on budget.
"We're excited to share progress in the new classroom building and independence leadership academy," De Jong said, noting the project includes eight classrooms — six for pre-K and kindergarten and two for special education — two administrative offices and teacher work areas. He said the construction budget is $3,700,000 and the schematic estimate is $3,670,000. "So we're just on the budget."
The update said construction documents are expected to be completed early next year, and De Jong projected substantial completion in March 2027.
Gene Elazar, speaking for Alvin Fairburn and Associates as architect for Chesterfield Elementary, said that project moved from an 8-classroom to a 10-classroom addition after cost estimates came in under budget. "We're hopefully gonna be able to provide 10 classrooms. It originally called for 8. The budget right now, it look like we can provide 10," Elazar said. He said the design team has finished programming, completed survey and geotechnical field work and is awaiting reports; the project is scheduled to go out for bid in March with about a one-year construction period.
A separate campus project referred to in the meeting as "Nissan" is also in schematic design. Presenters said the team increased that addition to 10 classrooms after initial estimates returned well under the $4.2 million budget; they expect to advertise for bids in December or early January and estimated roughly a one-year build time.
Why this matters: the additions are intended to relieve crowding and add special-education and early-childhood capacity. The presenters repeatedly emphasized monitoring construction costs and completing required surveys and site reports before moving to bid.
Board members asked for clarifications about geotechnical reports, parking and site access tied to the additions. Those operational questions were described in the meeting notes but did not constitute formal board votes to start construction; presenters said next steps are design-development approvals and completion of construction documents before advertising for bids.
The board did not take a formal funding vote on these specific schematic designs during the session covered by this report; presenters framed the updates as progress reports and next steps toward design development and bidding.
