Linderman Elementary gymnasium demolished

The Linderman Elementary School gymnasium demolished late Tuesday morning.

The Linderman Elementary School gym, which built in the 1940s, had it’s roof collapse in January of 2018, after a severe snowstorm, and Polson School Districts had to bring structural engineers in from out of state to assess the damage.

The School District hopes to have a new gymnasium facility by the fall of 2020.

“We are now 18 months into this process,” Weltz said. “The negotiations are long and arduous between us, the traveler’s insurance, and it took a lot of hard work, and decisions to moving forward to produce a new facility. We hope to have a safer facility, and it is exciting.”

In spite of the progress, Weltz said he felt losing the facility will come with a lot of emotion as many members of the Mission Valley have a lot of memories associated with the gym.

“However, that comes with a lot of emotions because there is a lot of memories in that old building, and it is hard for us to progress and move forward,” Weltz said.

Weltz said he felt they had moved forward towards building a new structure.

“This was a significant work in progress after the weather event (in Jan. of 2018) when we had a significant amount of snowfall on the south end of the gymnasium,” Polson School District Superintendent Rex Weltz said. “We kept the wall from falling off the edge of the roof because obviously if you hit someone parapet wall to keep the snow from falling off, and it finally gave way, and broke off crashing through the locker rooms on the south end of the gym.”

Weltz credits maintenance director Dan Giles for his work.

“I would like to thank (Polson) community for patience worked this project funded through insurance and 18 months of working centered around this where I believe insurance funded project worked hard burden to the taxpayers for this project that is a lot of dial-ups centered on our conversation,” Weltz said.