Arlee school district breaks ground on pair of building projects
Photo by Trent Makela -- (L-R) Trustee Becky Clizbe, superintendent John Jay Miller, student Isaiah LaMere and school board chairman Ron Ritter take part in the groundbreaking ceremony.
By Sarah Leavenworth / Leader staff
ARLEE - The Arlee school district broke ground Friday afternoon on a pair of multi-million dollar building projects.
"We finally did it, for Pete's sake," commented Arlee district clerk Lonnie Morin.
Community and school board members joined several hundred Arlee students and representatives of Sirius Construction, the projects' architectural firm, at 2 p.m. Friday. The ceremony, capped off with a barrage of snowflakes, took place between the current school building and the school's administration facility.
The first phase of the elementary project, which Lonnie Morin said will cost $1,456,245, includes the construction of a 10-room side wing of the district's school building. The new facility will feature a secretary's office, a special education room and additional classrooms. Morin said
Work will also begin on a multipurpose room and gym, which will house a kitchen, lunch room, wrestling and weight rooms and a gym to serve the entire school district. The price tag of the project is $2,991,355, according to Morin. Funding for the project will not cover completion of the wrestling room, she said.
The projects are being funded through a bond measure. Voters gave their stamp of approval to funding the project in November, 2006, and bonds were sold in March of last year.
By contract, the projects are to be completed within the next 365 days, Morin said, at which point the school plans to host a ribbon cutting celebration. The Sirius architect working on the project is Jay Kirby.
"Hopefully next week, we are going to start our new school project," board chairman Ron Ritter said at the April 22 board meeting. "I am really excited about this. It's something that we've been working on long and hard.
"It's important to us to use the local contractors as much as we can and every indication to us has been that they are, in fact going to do that," Ritter added. "The whole time we've been talking on this we've been talking a one-year project. So, allowing all of the teachers time to get their stuff moved, we're certainly anticipating that when the kids come back for the 09-10 school year, we will be using the new facilities."