Carson City school trustees updated on $50 million in projects

The facilities master plan for Carson City schools is nearing completion, and the school board received an update at its Feb. 12 meeting on where the district’s various sites stand in terms of progress and priorities.

Future projects for area schools this coming year will be based on definite needs, but Mark Korinek, director of operations, noted recent assessments and walkthroughs at each site. These took into consideration some “wants” expressed by administrators, custodians and teachers they felt were important to their school’s infrastructure. It was also an opportunity to note whether items or buildings were deteriorating.

Tenant improvements for all of Carson City’s schools will cost about $50 million, and prices will be adjusted as they are now about 30 percent higher today than they were two years ago after original walkthroughs were completed.

The district has sorted through several project categories with priorities since formulating its original master plan committee in 2015 at Superintendent Richard Stokes’ request, taking into account programs including prekindergarten, special education and growing building capacity, Career and Technical Education and other programs.

Korinek reviewed highlights on completed work and projects yet to be done with a timeline for expected completion:

The Fritsch Elementary connection project was finished in spring of last year and came in over budget, with construction costs about 30 percent higher than they were two years ago. There were some weather-related conditions, and it brought the total of the project about $50,000, or 12 percent, more than expected.

Pioneer High School was about 75 percent done as of the Feb. 12 report and was expected to be complete as of the end of February or early March, Korinek said. Phase 1, including tenant improvements to building A with remodeling to building B, was complete. Phase 2 is a 10,000-square-foot expansion of the campus with a building C to include a chemistry lab and Career and Technical Education classroom along with a kitchen, server room, innovation center, multipurpose room and commons area.

The Fremont Elementary and Mark Twain Elementary project was just beginning, Korinek said, with a notice to proceed issued Jan. 2. Fremont will be expanded by more than 12,000 square feet and Mark Twain by more than 13,000 square feet to allow for increases in enrollment and improvements in pre-kindergarten and kindergarten, general education, special education and early childhood development spaces. Mark Twain will receive at least three new portables. Completion is expected in mid-August this year. At Fremont, weather has caused some delays with winter construction.

In September, Carson Middle’s STEM lab is expected to be completed, converted from a previous metal lab that was used for storage. An elevator modernization project also has been finished.

Work on Eagle Valley Middle is complete, with Korinek showing photos of the students’ television studio and their green screen.

Seeliger Elementary and Bordewich Elementary projects, in conceptual design with different architects, include tenant improvements. Seeliger will be remodeling its Comprehensive Life Skills classrooms that will move to Fremont and be made into three standard classrooms to add capacity. The portable will be removed. Seeliger’s boys and girls’ restrooms will be renovated, including fixture and partition replacements and repainting, as the budget allows.

Bordewich tenant improvements included adding a classroom, refreshing the boys and girls bathrooms and reroofing the multipurpose room. Estimated completion is August this year.

At Carson High, the parking lot was repaved and a new bus lane was added, but there previously was no access to the transportation yard. Korinek said that was added on in the fall. Two gates were added to the fences so buses can line up to pick up students at the pick-up point. The Rip Rap “River” project also was finished Jan. 6 with the banks of the ditch wrapped with rock. Trustee Laurel Crossman also mentioned submitting a request to repaint the school.

Korinek also highlighted projects on the district’s operational facilities and other miscellaneous site needs. Actuators are being replaced to address issues with maintaining heat, especially as some classrooms or facilities begin falling below 68 degrees, and this has differed from site to site, Korinek said.

Trustee Stacie Wilke asked about the state of the school’s playgrounds, particularly at Mark Twain, which Principal Ruthlee Caloiaro addressed after Korinek’s presentation.

“There’s been a little bit of heartburn; however, not all of the playground is missing,” she said, adding the construction superintendent has made sure the students’ needs have been met. “He’s constructed walkways where his workers can’t go out there at certain, specific times and making sure we have access to what we have. … It is not ideal, however, we have six months we have to deal with and then we’ll have a brand new area out there.”