ROCKLAND, Maine — The estimated cost of additions to the Rockland-area high school and middle school range from $7 million to $16.5 million.
The Regional School Unit 13 Board is expected to be presented with recommendations from its facilities committee at the full board’s Oct. 6 meeting on how to proceed. The board could decide at that meeting to set a late winter referendum for district residents to approve borrowing money for the projects, RSU 13 Business Manager Peter Orne said Tuesday.
The estimated cost of the work at the two schools is in addition to the $8 million in energy conservation projects already approved by the board for schools throughout the five communities. The $16.5 million does not include proposals to either expand the Owls Head Central School or to build a new elementary school at that site.
Orne said the board could ask architects to go back and eliminate some of the proposals. He said the top priority is to add classroom space to Oceanside Middle School so sixth-graders can be there for the start of school next September.
The district has been in the midst of realigning its buildings as part of the Schools of the Future plan unveiled a year ago. The cost estimates provided by WBRC architects and engineers are the first firm numbers developed for the projects.
The original projection by school officials for all the projects including the energy conservation had been $13 million. Orne pointed out that the current estimates are based on including everything sought by staff into the projects.
The most costly option at Oceanside High School in Rockland is $9.1 million and calls for an addition to the cafeteria and a new larger kitchen. The current administrative offices would be converted to classrooms and the offices would be moved to where the current kitchen is located and make that the new main entrance. The former space for bus repairs would be converted to classrooms. There would also be major renovations, including an elevator, to the lower level where the locker rooms are located.
A less costly option would simply be to expand the kitchen and cafeteria at $2.9 million.
At Oceanside Middle School in Thomaston, the most costly option is $7.5 million and would consist of adding a four-classroom wing, building new larger cafeteria and kitchen and converting the existing ones to classroom space, and building an approximately 5,000-square-foot bus garage on the site.
A less costly $4.1 million option would eliminate the bus garage as well as some other renovations. The district currently leases a garage in Thomaston to store its buses.
There are no cost estimates yet for an addition at the Owls Head Central School or for a new school at that property, Orne said. Architect Jason Merriam and engineer Mike Sabatini will soon be presenting its report to the school on that project.
The district wants to close the Gilford Butler School in South Thomaston, which serves students in kindergarten through second grade from Owls Head and South Thomaston. The district’s plan calls for moving those students to Owls Head at either the expanded or new school.
Orne said while the costs are more than initially projected, keeping the status quo would result in increasingly higher maintenance and inefficiency expenses.