Construction firm selected

MJ:
Construction firm selected to build new Middletown schools
By Rick McCrabb

Staff Writer
MIDDLETOWN —
A local committee and a state agency have selected a construction firm that will be responsible for building a middle school and renovating Middletown High School, projects expected to cost about $95 million, school officials said.

Lend-Lease, which has offices in Cincinnati and Columbus, was selected from the three finalists and will be presented to the Middletown City Schools District board of education for approval at a meeting, probably next month, said Sam Ison, district superintendent. The firm was selected by local representatives and the Ohio Schools Facilities Commission, Ison said.

No construction start date has been announced and Ison expects the project to take 18 to 24 months to complete.

Once finished, a new middle school will be built on the high school grounds on Breiel Boulevard and MHS will see major improvements, officials said. Most of the funding for the project will come from local residents, who passed a $55 million bond issue and a 0.26-mill permanent improvement levy in May. The district will receive $95 million for the projects with $40 million of that coming from the OSFC, officials said.

The three construction finalists were rated individually by the committee members, and the firm with the highest rating was selected after the scores were tabulated by the OSFC, Ison said.

One of those committee members, the Rev. Gregory Tyus, vice president of the school board, said he was impressed by the firm’s commitment to economic inclusion and its use of women and minority owned businesses. Tyus said when given a choice, he always spends his money in Middletown, and he believes the district should follow the same financial footprint.

“That’s a big thing for me,” Tyus said.

Ison said he was particularly interested in how the construction company plans to work around the school days, traffic flow, student and staff safety and cooperate with the residents who live near the school. He said the project must be completed while minimizing interruptions to academics.

The company is currently working on several projects with the Lebanon City Schools District, said Jim Swartzmiller, vice president.

The $56 million Lebanon deal includes building a new middle school and renovating an elementary and intermediate school, he said. Swartzmiller said the Lebanon projects are about 10 months ahead of Middletown.

The company also was interested in school projects in Fairfield and Princeton, but wasn’t selected, he said.

Swartzmiller said building the middle school and renovating MHS will be “a huge economic driver” in the community. He said the firm will employ many local contractors and purchase local materials.

Buying local, he said, provides “better quality” because those companies and their employees typically live in the area.

“They want it to look nice when they drive by for the next 20 years,” he said.

The firm also embraces diversity and inclusion, he said.

The district’s middle school, described on election signs around Middletown as “one of the oldest schools” in the state, was built in 1923 for more than $1 million, making it at the time the most expensive school to be built in the country, said George Long, business manager. In the 91 years since, the school that has served as the high school, freshman building and Vail Middle School, has received two renovations in 1953 and 1961, he said.

Long said the cost of building a 135,000-square-foot middle school on the grounds of the high school is $37 million, $7 million less than repairing the Middletown Middle School.

Buy local materials??? So the new building is going to comprised of steel slabs and toilet paper??? (Well, I guess they WILL need plenty of that with all the crap flowing out of the BOE and City Hall...)