BELLEFONTE — Bellefonte Area School District will be bringing in help as it moves forward with the long-discussed goal of updating its aging elementary schools. On July 19, the district’s board agreed to hire SiteLogIQ, a Minneapolis based firm, to help manage the project moving forward. The decision came after a recommendation from the Elementary School Committee to bring the firm on board during a July 19 meeting. Committee chair and board member Jon Guizar said, “We recognize that one of the problems that we have had in past projects with this scope and size is that the district just does not have anyone on staff with the experience or expertise to manage a project this size. I think that is pretty common for any school throughout the state.” SitelogIQ will work with the district for six months at a price tag of $3,000 a month, for a grand total of $36,000.
Guizar said SiteLogIQ would take a look at the elementary school building assessment completed by Hunt Engineering and adjust some of the numbers for inflation.
Damion Spahr, a SiteLogIQ representative from Harrisburg who will be working with the district, added, “SiteLogIQ will confirm the Hunt study costs and will make adjustments for inflation so that the district can understand what its options are in today’s dollars. Because the Hunt study, I believe, was completed prior to COVID and prior to the current inflation that we have. So, we will be able to make those adjustments.”
The assessment by Hunt provided the district with seven possible options, which were whittled down to three that were considered to be in line with the district’s educational, financial and infrastructural goals in September. Guizar said the district still has much work to do before it makes a final decision.
“I don’t want anyone to get the wrong impression; nothing has been decided about the elementary school program. We still have several options, and the district is trying to cull that down to what we can afford and how that fits into what Hunt presented and we brought to the public. So, now we need to bring those up to date, cost and scope wise. The scope is going to be narrowed to save on some funds and SiteLogIQ, if approved, we really feel, can help us through that process and keep things moving,” said Guizar.
He added SiteLogicIQ would help guide the district through public meetings, public hearings, a review and update of the most recent needs assessment, the development of a preliminary budget/ schedule and guidance through the final selection of a path forward. SiteLogicIQ would also collaborate with the district and the elementary committee to facilitate the architect solicitation and selection process.
Guizar said SiteLogIQ also would look at the 100 acres of land the district owns behind the high school and determine if it would be a feasible location for a potential new building.
“The trouble is, it’s farmland with no electric, no water, no sewer, no anything, no suitable traffic flow. So, the other thing that we don’t want to do is make a decision on a path forward on the elementary program and say that we would like to do this, but we need a piece of property to do it with and then start the process of looking at this piece of property that we have and then finding out that is potentially suitable or finding out that there are issues that make it cost prohibitive,” said Guizar.
After a presentation by Spahr, board chair Jeff Steiner said that while “this is the path forward” for the project, he would vote against bringing the company on.
“I absolutely support what we are doing, but it was exactly two years ago … when we were doing the football stadium, and we had a construction manager who was doing something on the line of what Damion is doing, and I, by that point, had severe heartburn, because I didn’t feel as though this man was looking out for our best interests to the standard that I would want,” said Steiner. He added, “This is something that is going to affect our students, our staff, our community for a century. The budget for this project is going to be close to our annual budget. It was two years ago that I made my mind up that, moving forward for this, I would not vote to approve the project managers or even the architect for that matter, because I did not want to be encumbered by that yes vote.”
Guizar said that aside from bringing in an outside firm such as SiteLogIQ to do this job, the district could hire someone as a district employee to serve as the construction manager for the project, but it would likely cost five times as much.
In the end, the board voted 7-1 to bring on SiteLogIQ. Steiner was the only board member who voted against the motion. Julie Fitzgerald was absent.
