The Raymond School Board at their July 8th Board meeting voted to continue with a Lamprey River Elementary School Building Committee to determine the best means of solving some of the space issues at the elementary school. This is wonderful news for our elementary school students! A preliminary plan, as determined by the Lamprey River Elementary School Building Committee who completed their work in June, calls for a 12 class room addition and a gymnasium addition that will allow us to remove all the portables currently at the elementary school- both detached and attached.
The attached portables are ones that are owned by the District and are in poor shape. In spite of all the improvements and upkeep done over the years, they still need such things as new windows and doors. The detached portables are the ones that can be seen from the front parking lot. These six classrooms are rented by the District at a cost of $36,000 per year. Besides needing constant work, being in these portables also require students to go outside whenever they need to use the restrooms, see the nurse, attend a unified arts class, are called to the office, go to lunch, see a counselor, use the library, etc. etc. This is not a good situation for our students! All of these trips are necessary no matter what the weather is outside.
Here's where we are in the process. The Lamprey River Elementary School Building Committee was established in May and held regular meetings with the purpose of presenting their findings to the School Board at a meeting in July. The Committee was chaired by Tina Thomas with Erin Brewitt as Vice-Chair and Sandy Ellis as Secretary. Committee members included Todd Ledoux, Facilities Director; Ron Brickett, Business Administrator; Ellen Small, Superintendent; John Harmon, School Board member; and members of the community and parents: Amy Faust, Dean Plender, and Sean Ahearn. Meetings were held throughout May and June while the committee examined past information about the current buildings, recommendations from previous Building Committees, as well as, a needs assessment.
This committee came to a consensus that an addition to replace the portables and the addition of a gym would be the best plan for the elementary school while keeping in mind the taxpayers ability to pay. (Students currently have physical education classes in their classrooms when other students are having lunch in the cafeteria.) Part of this plan will include flood proofing the current elementary building. We have estimated the cost of the additions and improvements to be $7,169,983- remember this is only an estimate. This amount is about what we would have been required to pay if we had built a new building and had received building aide from the state of NH. It appears that school districts will no longer be able to count on building aide from the state.
We are putting together a new Building Committee to continue this work and have some openings. The committee will determine a meeting schedule that will begin in August as we go forward with next steps, provide citizens with information, and, hopefully, present a proposal to the voters in March 2016. If you are interested in joining this committee, please send a letter of intent by 3:00 PM July 29 to Jennifer Gillespie at the SAU office or email your request to her at: j.gillespie@sau33.com
The School Board will choose new members of the Lamprey River Elementary School Building Committee and approve the Charge for their work at the July 29 meeting. I look forward to working with the citizens of Raymond on this important work.
