Thursday's Internet Edition, August 28, 2008.
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Jesse Nicholas stands in an opening as he repairs the roof of the old ice plant building along Black Walnut Avenue in Spencer. |
Publisher - A request for funding for a new gymnasium at Geary Elementary/Middle School was turned down by the state School Building Authority this week.
The SBA had $256 million in requests, and less than $92 million to hand out.
Only 18 of the 41 projects were funded through the Needs Projects program, and five more were funded through emergency grants.
The largest award was $16 million to Mingo County to build a new consolidated high school for students in grades 9-12 currently attending Burch, Gilbert, Matewan and Williamson high schools.
On the other end of the spectrum, Gilmer County received an emergency grant of $100,000 to assist with temporary classrooms at Normantown Elementary, which has been plagued with mold problems.
Roane had requested just under $4.7 million for an addition at Geary that would include a new gym and five classrooms including a science lab and music classroom.
The proposal would have included another $250,000 in local funds, bringing the total project cost to more than $4.9 million.
Mike Offutt, director of facilities for the Roane County School system, said the project is badly needed.
“You basically have a middle school student body operating in a building that is designed for elementary students, Offutt said.
He said the school’s multipurpose room, which functions as a gym, cafeteria and music classroom may work well for students up until the third or fourth grade.
“But it doesn’t work very well when you have older kids wanting to play competitive sports,” he said. “They really don’t have a gym to do that in.”
Written proposals were submitted in December, and in March officials from each county spoke to the SBA about their projects.
On Monday the SBA made their decisions.
Offutt said five counties planning to put bond issues before their voters were funded first.
“They were almost automatically approved, with the understanding that they have to pass a bond,” Offutt said.
“It only took about 10 minutes for those projects to be approved,” he said.
Five projects were approved as alternates, in case those bond issues did not pass, but Roane failed to make that list as well.
This is the first time the Geary project has been presented to the full SBA. No SBA projects were approved last year, but Offutt said Roane will have another chance next year, when the SBA is expected to add another $20 million to the amount awarded this year.
He said the Roane Board of Education, which in the past has listed the Geary project as their number one goal, would have to resubmit the project when the time comes.
“The board will have to make that decision,” he said. “But in the meantime, we can work with the SBA staff to see if they have any recommendations for modifications we might be able to make to the project.”
