Hays' Roosevelt Elementary School addition price set at $21.9 M

A rendering of the new entrance of Roosevelt Elementary School. The school is being renovated as part of a $143.5 million bond issue. A new addition will increase the school's capacity to five classes for each grade. Image courtesy of DLR

By CRISTINA JANNEY
Hays Post

The Hays USD 489 school board received the maximum price for the Roosevelt Elementary School addition and remodel during a special meeting on Monday.

Nabholz Construction, the construction manager at risk, set that price at $21.9 million. That is about 1 percent of the estimated price for the project.

Preston Moore of Nabholz said that was an excellent result, as many other projects have seen their projects' costs go up much more with recent inflation.

The work is part of a $143.5 million bond issue. Roosevelt, which has three classes of each grade, will be expanded to accommodate five classes of each grade.

Roosevelt's new gym also will be a storm shelter. It will have a drop-down screen that could be used during assemblies and a partition that would allow two gym classes to be conducted at once. Image courtesy of DLR

The school will be able to accommodate 690 students once the renovations are complete.

The project is scheduled to be completed in December 2024.

As the construction manager at risk, Nabholz guarantees $21.9 million will be the maximum project cost. Any savings that are found in the project go back to the school district.

The $21.9 million includes the project budget, design fees and owner costs, such as furnishings and fixtures.

The district has several alternates that were parts of the Roosevelt bids. One of these included replacing damaged doors in the existing building.

A rendering of one of the new classrooms at Roosevelt. Image courtesy of DLR<br> — A rendering of one of the new classrooms at Roosevelt. Image courtesy of DLR

If savings can be found, the district would likely opt to do some of this additional work.

More than 3,200 companies were invited to bid on the Roosevelt contracts. The project received 125 bids. Local contractors were selected for 36 percent of the total cost of the project, which Moore also said was a good number.

On most of Nabholz's recent projects, only about 20 percent of the work was done by local contractors.

Official groundbreaking on the project will be at noon, May 18, on the north side of the school. You can RSVP by emailing ccrough@usd489.com.