School renovation moves ahead

“We've seen many such referendums fail in the state,” said Van Keulen, “So we feel pretty good that 63 percent of our voters support the kids and want these improvements to move forward,” she added.

Minneota voters approved the $5.25 million referendum by a vote of 424-251 last week. The estimated time period for completion of the projects is April-Aug. 2018. If the projects are not all completed by Aug. 2018, they will be completed in the summer of 2019.

“We do not know who will be the contractor until we open and award the bids,” said Van Keulen.” The school board has hired Joe Henn of CTS Group as the project manager. Henn also did last summer’s project at Minneota.

Henn has lived and worked in Marshall the last 30 years and has successfully completed hundreds of projects in 48 states and five provinces of Canada. He was the project manager for other schools such as Marshall, MACCRAY, Montevideo, Canby, Martin County West, Windom and Winona.

Bid documents are currently being prepared and bids will be submitted from vendors in November and December. None of the improvements would have been possible without the referendum passing, school administrators said. Those bids will then be presented to the district office and opened on Dec. 14, with bids being awarded on Dec. 19.

The elementary school in Minneota was built in 1950 and expanded in 1961, but has not had any major renovations done over the past 65 years. The high school, including the competition gym and locker rooms, were built in 1957 and it has been over 60 years since any major improvements were made to any of those areas.

“We worked with a project manager to narrow the scope of the project and to get a plan together in the beginning. Then we consulted a school finance expert to come up with the best way to fund the project.”

“We held public meetings, wrote articles for the paper, put information on our website, blogs and social media, spoke at various community events etc. to answer questions and educate the voters on this project. It was a rather large team effort.”

In addition to the elementary school improvements; locker rooms; lunchroom and lighting renovations, the board is hoping bids will come in below estimates so they can add a couple of other areas.

The following are outside projects the school board would like to add:

•Clean up outside courtyard from all debris and garbage.

•Install lighting along Monroe Street school sidewalk from the parking lot to Fifth Street to provide a safer walking path.

•Build a new shelter for school vehicles to be protected from the elements and also to provide more storage space.