SCASD board OKs 90 percent design plans for elementary schools project

The State College Area school board on Monday unanimously approved the 90 percent design plans for the Corl Street, Houserville and Radio Park Elementary School construction projects.

Crabtree, Rohrbaugh and Associates, an architectural firm from Mechanicsburg, provided the district with the plans that estimate the costs of the projects.

The Corl Street project will be a mixture of new construction and renovation and is estimated to cost about $17.6 million. The Houserville project involves the construction of a new building, and demolition of the existing Houserville Elementary building, and is estimated to cost about $20.6 million.

The Radio Park project is also a mixture of new construction and renovation, but the board is considering two construction options: A three classroom per grade option that is estimated to cost about $21.6 million and a four classroom per grade option that is estimated to cost $23 million.

If the board chooses the less-expensive, three classrooms per grade option, the new construction portion of the school would not be large enough to hold all of the students during the second phase of the project, which could lead to about 100 students being bussed to an alternate location for the 2018-2019 school year, according to Ed Poprik, director of physical plant.

The Houserville and Radio Park projects are eligible for state grant money totaling about $1.9 million for each school.

All three projects are eligible for the state’s PlanCon school construction reimbursement program, which returns money to school districts based on the amount of educational square footage completed. The district estimates that each school is eligible for reimbursement of between $1.1 million and $1.5 million.

The next step in the process will come on Sept. 25 when the board will vote to approve the final project plans and grant permission to bid.

The bid process will open on Nov. 2 and the contracts will be awarded on Nov. 13. If the projects are approved, construction on all three projects could begin in January and the work would be completed by the end of summer 2019.

This story was originally published August 28, 2017 at 11:02 PM with the headline "SCASD board OKs 90 percent design plans for elementary schools project."