Spring Break
Talawanda works to build new school
Jillian Engel
Issue date: 12/2/08 Section: Front Page
|
Since the $4.7 million bond issue passed 52 percent to 48 percent in November's general election, Talawanda School District staff has been finalizing plans to begin construction for the new high school.
Holli Morrish, Talawanda School District's community relations coordinator, said the school district looked everywhere for available land and talked to multiple property owners about constructing the high school on their properties.
But it was Leonard Erik, owner of the Erik Farm, who approached the school board with an extremely reasonable rate, Morrish said.
"Sometimes we were looking at a price … that was around $20,000 or $30,000 per acre," Morrish said. "We are buying the Erik property for $8,500 per acre."
Morrish said the Erik family had a family vision that, someday, their farm would be the site of a new high school.
"This is our opportunity to bring Mr. Erik and his wife's dream and vision to reality," Morrish said.
However, the property's location outside of Oxford's city limits means construction processes do not have to be approved by Oxford City Council, nor does Oxford have to tend to emergency services of the property either, according to Morrish.
"There have been discussions between the Talawanda School District and the City of Oxford of possible annexation of the property into the city limits so emergency and other city services could be available to the site," Morrish said.
On Nov. 21, Superintendent Phil Cagwin met with the architect and construction manager to begin discussions of the time frame for completion of the school.
Because the typical construction time for a high school the size of Talawanda's to be built would be about three years, Cagwin said they hope to beat that time frame and not have to wait to move their students until January of 2012.
"Without compromising the quality of construction and the opportunity for community and faculty input into the design of the building, we are looking for ways to compact the time frame so we can open the building in the late summer or early fall of 2011," Cagwin said.
Viewing Comments 1 - 1 of 1
Communitarian
posted 12/02/08 @ 10:18 AM EST
This is wonderful. Hopefully this will make way for a nice park or residential neighborhood. Staff should have the opportunity to live close to campus. (Continued…)
Post a Comment