Winchester Board of Education discusses renovations

By Editor | September 17, 2024 |

By JESSICA BROWN

The Winchester School Board met on Tuesday, September 10. After Roll Call was finished, budget issues were discussed with an approval of minutes from the August 13th meeting. Financial reports were given and approval for payment of bills was passed, followed by administrative reports given by Winchester Elementary School Assistant Principal Nick Zuhone and Winchester High School Principal Denny Vortman.

Among issues discussed by Zuhone were the end of baseball and softball seasons, which he described as successful. Also in order was a congratulations for August Students of the Month, the upcoming Fall Book Fair, the recent upstart of the Teen Reach After School Program that many of the grade school students are taking part in and plans to revise the class schedule of the Junior High to allow longer class periods for core subjects and smaller class sizes to allow more one on one time with teachers.

Principal Vortman mentioned that there were five students in the Senior class that were requesting to graduate early, the August Students of the Month and Winchester High School student enrollment, which increased slightly from last year. “We have 172 students enrolled this year,” he said. Vortman said he was also pleased with student turnout for Free Lunch Monday, which is in its 19th year. “There were 120 students who were served last Monday,” he said. The program involves volunteers from the community, namely churches, preparing and serving the high school students free lunch periodically.

The five Winchester High School Seniors who were petitioning for Early Graduation were present at the meeting and each spoke individually in front of the Board. They were asked to describe their plans immediately following graduation. Among them were Gracelynn Hettinger, Toni Naccaroto, Erryn Rivera, Kadience Savage and Talon Whicker.

Superintendent Kevin Blankenship then addressed Old Business, which included narrowing down how best to obtain contractors to begin plans for renovation of the Winchester High School building. He provided the Board with a short summary analysis of two of the most common options, the traditional design-bid-build method or using a Performance Contractor.

Traditional Design and Build:

– Architect design projects and then put out bids for the work, commonly used for simplified projects.

– Pros: Lower upfront cost and more control over the design process

– Cons: Potential overall costs, higher chance for risk allocation and adversarial relationships between design and construction teams.

Performance Contractor:

– One contractor plans and executes the entire project for one total price paid before the start of the renovation. Concentration is on facility upgrades and energy efficiency.

– Pros: Comprehensive, lower risk allocation, paying a single contractor rather than several. Guaranteed performance, reduced upfront cost and long term energy savings

– Cons: Construction delays, change in outcome expectations and uncertainty in accountability for work completed.

Blankenship then talked about the next steps toward realizing the renovation project, commenting that he would support a “hybrid situation” which would utilize components of both traditional design- bid- build and professional contracting. “I would recommend going with an architect and a construction management group,” he said.

In that scenario, Blankenship said he would be in contact with different groups who would work together with the architect and provide upfront cost estimations, including for unforeseeable challenges. As with a Performance Contractor, any unforeseen or overage costs would be the responsibility of the group, not the school. Construction groups would still be subject to bidding for the project, he said.

The first two priorities for renovation would be to remove asbestos in the high school building and install an ADA compliant elevator. Blankenship then commented that if the building will already be under renovation for those projects, which could include removing floors and cabinets, it would make sense to do other projects like replacing the HVAC system simultaneously. “If we’re going to take things apart to remove asbestos, we’d just have to take things apart again in the future to work on the HVAC,” he said. The asbestos removal and elevator would be an estimated cost of $700,00.

The School Board’s Building Committee will be working in the next weeks on deciding which renovation method to use and report back findings at the next School Board meeting.