Huntington Middle School prioritized for June 2026 as city, schools report construction progress on Southeast Community Resource Area

City and school officials updated the Newport News City Council and School Board on construction progress for the Southeast Community Resource Area, which includes the new Huntington Middle School and an attached recreation center. City Director of Engineering Craig Gallant said the contractor received a notice to proceed in June and that substantial completion for the middle school is targeted for June 2026 and for the recreation center in August 2026.

The update matters because the two facilities will be adjacent on a single site and the middle school’s opening is timed to allow the school division months to outfit classrooms and prepare operations before the school year. Gallant said, “The middle school itself is what has priority,” and that the contractor is managing two separate site teams under a single contract to try to meet the staggered completion dates.

Gallant summarized the project scope and immediate issues. The new middle school is roughly 123,000 square feet; the recreation center is about 97,000 square feet. Construction progress is roughly 36–37 percent for both facilities because the contract was issued as a single package with separate crews. The project encountered three buried storage tanks on the former school site (the area allocated for the recreation center), which required removal and soil mitigation before work could continue in that zone. Gallant said permitting and procurement issues have slowed some submittals, and the contractor has issued multiple resubmittals to meet design requirements.

City staff identified several critical-path items: bringing electrical service and a transformer to the site (the city is coordinating with Dominion), stormwater infrastructure that serves both buildings, and structural steel erection. Gallant said Dominion had procured the transformer and that the utility’s design information was expected to be delivered to the contractor during the week of the meeting. He also listed near-term construction priorities: rooftop HVAC units, exterior walls, interior CMU walls and roof decking, exterior doors and windows, and continued stormwater work.

Officials gave updated budget numbers. The presentation listed a construction cost of about $77 million for the school and $67 million for the recreation center. Change orders to date were small relative to project cost: roughly 2.4 percent for the school and 1.5 percent for the recreation center. Gallant said some change orders were used to expedite procurements for long-lead items.

School operations and logistics were also discussed. Rusty Fairhart, the school division’s chief operations officer, said the division has been working with the city and architects on move-in preparations. Fairhart said the division has a furniture committee and is finalizing furniture selections and other finish decisions; he noted the division is close to finalizing a color palette and is awaiting one final terrazzo sample before instructing architects to provide samples to the contractor. Fairhart said the schools are coordinating with alumni to develop interior graphics that reflect Huntington’s history.

City and school officials described routine coordination: construction progress meetings every two weeks with school staff, and additional calls as needed. Gallant and Fairhart said they are finalizing a schedule for finishes, furnishings and equipment so the school division will have time after substantial completion to install and test systems before students arrive. Officials said contingency planning is in place should procurement or permitting issues threaten opening-day plans — for example, temporary generators were discussed as a short-term option if some electrical components are delayed.

The presentation also addressed operational coordination of the joint complex: scheduling of shared spaces, responsibilities for maintenance and programming, and development of formal agreements so city and school programming can operate together once the facilities open.

Officials did not report a change to the June/August substantial-completion targets but cautioned that supply-chain delays, incomplete contractor submittals or additional unforeseen site conditions could affect the schedule. Gallant said the team is monitoring procurements closely and has discussed shifting contractor labor to the middle school if necessary to protect the June completion date.

Looking ahead, the city and school division will continue biweekly construction meetings, finalize finish and furniture deliveries, and complete remaining site utilities and structural work through the winter and spring months prior to the June milestone.