Poudre School District approves $3.1 million contract for Fort Collins High building automation; staff to confirm contract bond language

The Poudre School District R-1 Board of Education authorized expenditures in excess of $250,000 and approved a contract Jan. 14 to install a district-standard building automation system at Fort Collins High School.

The board voted 7-0 to authorize staff to execute the contract with Long Building Technology for approximately $3,100,000. The motion was seconded on the floor and approved by roll call: Jim Brokesh, Kristen Draper, Connor Duffy, Kevin Havelda, Carolyn Reed, Scott Schoenbauer and Jessica Zamora voting in favor.

District staff and board members explained the project is part of a multi-year effort to standardize building automation across the district so facilities staff can manage heating, ventilation and other mechanical systems centrally. General background materials cited a prior McKinstry engineering study that had identified the Fort Collins High automation system as a high priority.

Dave Montoya, the district finance lead, told the board the project was escalated after a boiler at Fort Collins High School failed this fall. "If 4a did not pass, we would probably not be doing things on a proactive basis... We would be waiting for them to fail and then replacing them at the moment," Montoya said, noting the recent voter-approved funding (referred to during the meeting as "4 a") has allowed the district to combine and accelerate related work rather than react to failures.

Montoya described building automation systems as the central control that manages mechanical and electrical systems across large school buildings and cited potential efficiencies from standardizing to a single vendor. The contract before the board follows an earlier district request for proposals that selected Long Building Technology as the district standard for automation.

Board members asked for more detail about the contract before execution. Director Carolyn Reed flagged that page 26 of the contract package appeared to strike a performance bond requirement and asked whether that was intentional. Montoya said staff would check with the district general counsel and correct contract language as necessary before final execution.

The project is scheduled to begin in summer 2025. The board also approved separate boiler work for the school on the consent agenda; district staff said they plan to replace all three original boilers at Fort Collins High School as part of coordinated work to improve reliability.

The board discussed the value of bundling related projects and of using the recently approved funding to move from reactive repairs to planned maintenance. Staff did not identify additional long-term operating-cost estimates during the meeting; they said more detailed contract and project documents are available in the board packet and will be finalized before execution.

The board then adjourned the public session and convened an executive session later in the evening.