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City Manager Phil Rodenberg (left) and Bob Burch, the city schools' operations director,
Fredericksburg City Council and School Board members walk through the construction site of Lafayette Upper Elementary School, taking part in a tour yesterday afternoon of the two schools the city is building at a cost of $51.2 million.
Mayor Tom Tomzak (left), Superintendent |
Wearing hard hats and riding around in a yellow school bus yesterday, Fredericksburg's top leaders got a glimpse of the city's educational future.
School officials led the city's manager, council members and School Board on a tour of Fredericksburg's $51.2 million investment in public education.
Since last February, Moseley Architects and English Construction Co. have been building two new schools in the city--Lafayette Upper Elementary and a replacement James Monroe High.
Yesterday's tour gave city officials a chance to see their progress firsthand.
The first stop was at Lafayette, which is being built off the U.S. 1 Bypass near Walker-Grant Middle School. The $14.3 million project is about halfway done, said school Director of Operations Bob Burch.
The 98,000-square-foot school will have space for about 880 students, grades three through five. Lafayette is opening in the fall, and Burch said construction is on schedule.
The roof is on, and visitors can walk down hallways and pop into unfinished classrooms that'll be equipped with projection screens. Moseley has tried to keep natural light flowing throughout the school.
But water still drips from above inside parts of the building, and dirt and plastic abound--signs there's still much work to be done in the next six months.
"It's hard to believe there are going to be kids running around here in September," said Schools Superintendent Dale Sander.
Lafayette's opening will affect each of the city's schools--Hugh Mercer Elementary will be kindergarten through second grade, and Walker-Grant Middle will be sixth through eighth.
Eighth-graders currently attend James Monroe, which was the second stop on yesterday's tour.
The $36.9 million James Monroe High replacement is about 10 percent to 15 percent done, Burch said. The 198,000-square-foot school will have room for about 1,000 students.
It takes a little more imagination to picture James Monroe's future. The roof is up on a three-court gymnasium that will be able to hold 1,800 spectators. That structure is visible from the U.S. 1 Bypass. The shell is also in place for a 1,000-seat auditorium.
But the rest of the project is mostly just beginning, full of outside areas punctuated by cinder blocks marking the spot of future construction.
"This is the art area," said Doug Westmoreland of Moseley Architects, as he pointed to an open-air patch of land. "Can your imagination see this?"
The new school is expected to open for the 2006-07 year. The current James Monroe will be demolished starting that fall; playing fields and parking lots will be built in its place. Burch said the whole thing should be done by the start of the 2007-08 school year.
That'll be about 3.5 years after the city approved the project, which is being paid for through bond issues from the Virginia Public School Authority.
Sander praised council members for not delaying. He said costs have gone up about 25 percent the past two years, caused partly by a construction boom in China and the rising cost of steel. But Fredericksburg is locked in at the negotiated contract price.
"You all made a really wise decision to move when you did," Sander said.
Unlike in Stafford and Spotsylvania, school construction in Fredericksburg hasn't been common. Walker-Grant was the last school to open, and that was in 1988. James Monroe has been open more than 50 years.
Westmoreland pledged to the group yesterday that the old school's replacement will be something everybody will be proud of.
"We really think the high school is going to be the cat's meow," Westmoreland said.
To reach BILL FREEHLING: 540/374-5424 bfreehling@freelancestar.com
