Uniontown school board gets updates on renovation costs
As the Uniontown Area School District weighs whether to consolidate buildings, representatives of the firm performing a feasibility study of the consolidation spoke to the public about what the costs would be of renovating the buildings.
Larry Levato, of Crabtree, Rohrbaugh & Associates, showed the public a color-coded evaluation of systems in each building, with red necessitating an upgrade within four years and yellow signifying they should be upgraded within five to 10 years.
He credited the district maintenance for extending many of the systems well past their normal replacement cycles.
“When you walk in your buildings, they shine,” he said. “The surfaces are clean, the conditions of them are very good. But that’s not to say that buildings don’t have requirements to them and needs … You have to do maintenance on these items over a period of time to be able to extend those lives before they become an emergency situation.”
Addressing the reds and yellows at each school would cost between $17.9 million and $20.6 million, factoring in 15% design contingency and assuming 3% inflation per year, he said.
Under the same conditions, comprehensive renovations of all seven schools would cost between $125.2 and $143.1 million, Levato said.
The board marked two grade configurations for further study by the administration.
One would make lower-level schools K-6 and move seventh- and eighth-grade students to Uniontown High School. Another would set elementaries at K-5, with configurations of sixth through eighth grade for middle school while ninth through 12 remain at the high school.
Under the first option, with three K-6 schools in operation, the district would save $5.2 million to $5.9 million in maintenance costs, Levato said.
Another option, with three K-5s, a middle school and high school building, cost savings over the current configuration would be slightly lower, between $3.8 million to $4.4 million.
The board had originally planned to vote on closing Franklin Elementary School at its March 23 meeting, a possibility met with a large amount of public outcry. At a work session last month, board President Don Rugola said no closures would happen until at least 2027. Grade configurations would be one of the things the board looked at over the next year, he said, along with curriculum needs, transportation needs, facility conditions, technology and staffing.