SALAMANCA — The committee that formed last March met one final time Jan. 17 to agree on a final recommendation to the Salamanca City Central School District board on what direction the upcoming capital project proposal should take.
The committee — made up of current board members, former and current district employees and district community members — reviewed the final changes made to the building floor plans before discussing project cost estimates and when the vote date should take place.
With the school board’s approval at a specially scheduled Jan. 31 meeting, the process for preparing the project for a May or June district vote would officially be underway. Although the project would total about $53 million, it would have zero cost to the community.
As of Jan. 17, Proposition One would include renovations at Prospect Elementary, about $6 million; renovations at Seneca Elementary and the junior-senior high school, about $19.5 million; building condition survey items at the two campuses and bus garage, about $21 million; and facade improvements, about $1.5 million.
A second proposition would include renovations to the fitness center and weight room, a new turf field inside the track, team rooms for athletes and new bathrooms and concessions for track and field patrons, totalling about $6 million.
Estimates have Excel Aid covering $785,000, state and federal aid covering more than $11.34 million and district reserves already in place covering $15.8 million. Although nearly $24.85 million would come from bonding, the bond principal payment plus interest, minus the annual building aid, would equal no cost to the community over the life of the bond.
“The aid that we’ve used to make these projections is already in hand,” said Superintendent Robert Breidenstein. “It doesn’t impact the existing levy and the reduction levy that we’ve had. It doesn’t impact going forward because the money is already in hand.
“If we utilize the amount in (district reserves), roughly $15.8 million, we could go higher than that to reduce the bonding or go lower than that and increase the bonding,” he continued. “Those are all considerations, but we have the $15.8 million in hand, and when we spend that it will bring our fund balance down … I’m concerned about a fund balance so high when we have an opportunity to use it for something that would benefit kids.”
SINCE THE committee meetings in November, several minor changes had been made to the floor plans for the renovations.
At Prospect Elementary, the main office would move to the front of the building where the current library and computer lab is located. By having the main office at the front, visitors would have to go through a check point off the main entrance before they have access to the rest of the building, explained Jeff Robbins from Hunt.
The library and computer lab would move to the current office space on the opposite side of the main lobby and corridor, putting it in the heart of the building and giving the library more windows and natural light. Robbins said the library and computer lab would have two main access points.
“The hallway would move also,” Robbins said. “It gives it more of a direct route instead of this zig-zag hallway, which is kind of awkward anyway.”
Climate control, including a central air conditioning unit for the entire building, would also be included with the renovations.
New updates to the Iroquois Drive campus included moving the Seneca Elementary offices to the front of the building near the nurse’s office near the cafeteria, gym and auditorium and moving the high school offices to the current district offices in the southeast corner of the junior-senior high.
The current elementary offices would become a multipurpose room for anything from big group meetings to additional cafeteria space. The current high school offices and entrance would become alternative education classrooms.
Throughout the Iroquois Drive campus, nine rooms have been specifically designated for Seneca Nation learning spaces for both Native American students and Seneca culture and history. Two additional rooms at Prospect Elementary have also been designated as Seneca learning spaces.
A district vote occurring in the spring depends on the board making a positive vote Jan. 31 to authorize the State Environmental Quality Review (SEQR) to determine the environmental impact of work on both campuses.
“To make the May 16 deadline, the board has to affirmatively authorize the SEQR no later than Jan. 31,” Breidenstein explained. “The board would have to, through that process, assuming that a declaration of negative impact was made, would have to accept that there is no impact environmentally by March 28 at the very latest.”
If the board were to wait a few weeks for both the SEQR authorization and the acceptance of the results from the SEQR, a June date would be possible, Breidenstein added. If the board does not authorize the SEQR by the end of February, the vote would have to wait until fall.
