Work on Carrollton gym won’t be completed by start of school

By Editor | July 28, 2026 |

By Carmen Ensinger

Carrollton High School students will be taking their physical education classes outside, weather permitting, for at least the first two or three weeks of school until the gym project is completed.
School board members learned this news at the July 20 school board meeting.
The gym is getting a make-over with new bleachers being installed, new windows, a new sound system, new lighting and new coating on the ceiling.
Superintendent Jason Bauer said almost everything is done, except for the bleachers.
“The bleachers won’t come in until about the middle of August,” he said. “Right now, they are just about done with the new ceiling and they will put up the new lights after that.”
With the first day of school scheduled to start on August 14, that means the bleachers probably won’t even arrive until after school has already started.
“The bleachers probably won’t be in until the last week of August,” Bauer said. “So, we will have to have PE classes someplace else for the first couple of weeks. But everything else will be done in there, except for the bleachers.”
There won’t be quite as much seating as with the old bleachers.
“The old seating had 10 rows of bleachers and with the new bleachers, we will have nine rows,” Bauer said. “But there will be more space between the sideline and that first row, too.”
Also being installed is a new sound system. The district chose Chris Ornellas to install a $20,400 sound system. This sound system is being paid for using Capital Projects funds.
Other improvements include new key fobs at both the high school and grade school, also being installed by Chris Ornellas at a cost of $12,540. Bauer said the current hardware on the doors that requires codes to enter hasn’t been working correctly for quite some time.
The Athletic Committee met on July 7 where additional discussion was held about a football coop. Bauer said they will talk with North Greene soon about possibilities of what that might look like if we were to go down that road and pursue a football co-op.
The district changed their health insurance carrier to Gravie that utilizes the Aetna national network.
“Our original bids that came back from our current carrier, United Healthcare, showed an increase of 34 percent the first time, and 21 percent the second time,” Bauer said. “We felt like that was too high so we made the change. The national average on health insurance increases is anywhere from 15 to 16 percent so to come in at 12 percent with Gravie we came in a little below the average.”
The board approved changing their trash service from Republic to GFL. Bauer said with GFL they are getting a bigger bin and pickup service three times a week, including Fridays, plus saving some money in the process.
The board also approved the new IRS mileage rate, retroactive to July 1. The rate increased 3.5 cents and is now 76 cents per mile. In addition, they approved the Stepping Stones contract for speech and language services.
Bauer said the board is discussing having the board meetings in the newly renovated high school library, in the future. The meetings are currently held in the grade school cafeteria.
They also discussed moving the December meeting from Dec. 21 to Dec. 14 in consideration of winter break.
Following a short closed session the board:
■ Employed April Edwards as Paraprofessional at the Grade School.
■ Employed Whitney Loellke as Family Liaison at the Grade School.
■ Employed Chloe Knowlton as Paraprofessional at the Grade School.
■ Approved maternity leave for Cynthia Seymour from Sept. 9 to Nov. 30.
■ Approved resignation of Molly Haskell as High School Cheerleading Coach.
■ Approved John Goode as High School Head Basketball Coach.
■ Approved Travis Klingler as High School Head Softball Coach.
■ Approved Michael Harris as Assistant Football Coach.
■ Approved Demetrius Hollis as Assistant Football Coach.