CCS provides updates on 3 major construction projects

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PITTSBORO — Chatham County Schools district staff said Monday that all major school construction projects are currently within budget.

Randy Drumheller, the district’s director of maintenance and construction, gave a quarterly update on three projects Monday to the Chatham County Board of Education during the board’s regular meeting.

Chatham Grove Elementary School

The school is on track for a February 3, 2020, completion date to be ready for students that fall. Located at 1301 Andrews Store Rd., Chatham Grove is the county’s newest elementary school and designed to relieve current and future overcrowding at Pittsboro and Perry Harrison Elementary Schools.

According to update documents from Monday’s agenda, the $27.5 million project is 15 days behind schedule, but construction personnel have increased working hours to recover time. The district has spent just under 59 percent of the total contracted funds, and about 60 percent of the project is complete.

A new part of the project, approved early last month, is the addition of one traffic lane and a stoplight to Andrews Store Road. Drumheller said Monday the addition was made under guidance from the N.C. Dept. of Transportation. The street will soon be home to four schools all in close proximity, with Margaret B. Pollard Middle School across the road from Chatham Grove and Woods Charter School and the future Willow Oak Montessori Charter School campuses nearby. The lane, according to documents, will cost $487,063.

Seaforth High School

The county’s fourth high school is scheduled for completion on April 6, 2021. The $61.8 million project is located at 444 Seaforth Rd. in Pittsboro, near Jordan Lake in the northeastern side of Chatham County.

Documents indicate that the school is 41 percent complete with 35.35 percent of the contracted funds spent on the project.

“This is not as far along as the other one but certainly a lot of stuff going on,” Drumheller said Monday. “Geothermal wells are going in. They’ve actually got about 80 of those done already.”

Construction crews are currently working on excavation for the school’s baseball and softball fields as well as structural fill and storm drainage structures at and around the football stadium.

New Central Services Building

The district is in the process of designing a new Central Services building to provide increased space for all the school systems’ administrative personnel. Some personnel currently work at Horton Middle School. Initial estimates place the total cost of the project at around $11.1 million

The new building is not yet fully designed, and thus not under construction, but will be located in front of the existing building on West Street, next to the Chatham County Sheriff’s Office’s headquarters. According to an update document from Chapel Hill-based architects CRA Associates, the “early phase of design work” has been completed, which includes “building program verification and the development and space allocation and adjacency diagrams.”

A site plan review package has been submitted to the Town of Pittsboro for review, which CRA Associates said is “the first step in a multi-phase review process required by the town.”

CRA added that the project is on schedule “at this time” with construction bids to be opened April 2020 and the building to be completed by October 2021.

Reporter Zachary Horner can be reached at zhorner@chathamnr.com or on Twitter at @ZachHornerCNR.