Facilities master‑planning options laid out: Wrightstown, sixth‑grade/middle‑school scenarios, Council Rock North, Chancellor Center among choices

The Council Rock School District Facilities Committee spent the bulk of its Feb. 6 meeting reviewing concept options for a facilities master plan that staff and consultants described as still in the "concept options" phase. The committee heard a wide collection of high‑level scenarios — maintenance‑only, minimum intervention, and full implementation of a multi‑year master plan — and probed potential project permutations and financing consequences.

"We do not have a draft master plan. We don't have a master plan," Ed Tate, chair of the Facilities Committee, said at the start of the master‑planning conversation, cautioning that the book of building assessments is a working tool rather than a final plan.

What the consultants presented

Architects and engineers (Schroeder Group and CHA) reviewed building condition assessments, capacity analysis and order‑of‑magnitude costs. The team used three unit‑cost assumptions for high‑level comparisons: $250 per square foot for heavy renovation, $350 per square foot for alterations (reconfiguration), and $450 per square foot for new construction. The spreadsheet the team shared mapped many options to those assumed unit costs plus site and soft costs to produce concept totals.

Options and examples discussed

- Wrightstown Elementary: The committee discussed the constraint of Wrightstown's existing site (including septic and site limits) and several responses: realignment (redistricting) to shift students to other schools; build a new elementary on the district's House Tract (a ~73‑acre parcel) sized at roughly 600 students (order‑of‑magnitude estimate: $70–80M including site and soft costs); or capture Wrightstown population through a sixth‑grade or middle‑school reconfiguration.

- Sixth‑grade center vs. grade‑band change: Consultants showed options for a standalone sixth‑grade center (one or two), or shifting to a 6‑8 middle‑school model. A sixth‑grade center on a large tract was modeled at about $60–80M (new construction plus site). Converting to 6‑8 middle schools would require additions or a new middle school (modeled at roughly 200 square feet per student and higher unit costs than elementary construction).

- Middle‑school relief tactics: Lower‑cost options included converting existing large‑group instructional (LGI) spaces to classrooms or adding modest additions (CHA estimated infill/alteration work at higher per‑square‑foot costs because of interior constraints; example: a Newtown LGI infill estimated at ~$3.2M plus soft costs). Larger options included building an additional middle school (rough order: $60–120M depending on size and scope) or developing a sixth‑grade center to shift enrollments.

- Council Rock High School North: The committee reviewed renovation vs. new construction. A full renovation order‑of‑magnitude used the $250/sq ft renovation rate; building a new 1,900‑student high school at contemporary construction escalation (estimated $450/sq ft) produced much larger totals. Consultants said a new high school built behind the current building — requiring temporary relocations and demolition sequence — could be in the low hundreds of millions; renovation phasing also adds years and modular campus needs.

- Richborough Middle School and the administrative center option: Consultants offered converting a portion of Richborough Middle School to house administrative functions (about 35,000 sq ft) and demolishing the remainder. The alternative is to demolish Richborough and build new facilities on that site (site remediation and demolition costs included in some scenarios).

- Chancellor Center (district administration building): Discussion of this historic administration building produced three price bands: a minimal safety/stabilization package (site/foundation and urgent exterior work) quoted in the meeting around $7.6M as a leading estimate; a fuller interior renovation cited in the materials at $11.4M; and a comprehensive renovation including exterior/site repairs that staff estimated could approach $15–16M. Staff warned that exterior foundation/water infiltration correction would require moving district administrative staff offsite during that phase and that the scope is not fully comparable, historically, to other renovation numbers without adding the site/exterior costs.

Board and public input

Board members repeatedly asked for additional detail: buildable envelopes for potential sites (House Tract, Richborough site), phasing timelines, and clearer definitions of what counts as "renovation" versus "alteration" to allow apples‑to‑apples comparisons. Several board members urged that administration produce educational‑program input (teaching implications of grade band changes) as a parallel analysis. Finance staff said they will model specific project sequences against the district's borrowing scenarios once the board narrows the set of preferred options.

Public comments during the meeting focused largely on Chancellor Center. Several speakers urged preserving the historic building, asked about grant prospects and the cost/benefit of repairing versus selling or leasing, and cautioned against immediately committing to new construction without exhausting renovation and funding options.

Next steps and board direction

Committee members asked staff to (1) refine costs for a small set of vetted scenarios (including full Chancellor Center scope that adds exterior/site repairs), (2) provide buildable‑envelope maps and property appraisals for House Tract and other candidate parcels, and (3) engage the Education Committee on grade‑band implications (6‑8 vs. sixth‑grade center) so the facilities options can be tied to educational models. Consultants said more detailed, escalated cost estimates and site analyses would be provided for the board once the set of preferred scenarios is narrowed.

The Facilities Committee did not select a preferred master‑plan option at the Feb. 6 meeting; the session was positioned as concept‑phase review and direction to staff to return with refined estimates and educational analysis.