Serving the High Plains
Serving the High Plains
SAN JON — State officials signaled they were receptive to a proposal from San Jon school officials and their architectural firm to build two full-size gymnasiums instead of preserving the two existing gyms for a new school.
Several members of the New Mexico Public School Facilities Authority chatted by videoconference with San Jon school board members and administrators, plus two representatives from Formative Architecture, during a work session Wednesday.
Voters in the San Jon district last fall approved a $250,000 bond issue, making it eligible for a no-match PSFA grant of at least $22 million to build a new school.
State officials recommended a new school instead of making repairs to the current facility, which includes a declining boiler system, leaky roofs, aging climate control systems and other longstanding issues.
The San Jon school board initially wanted to preserve its Ed Lee Activities Complex and a 1960s-era gymnasium as part of the project.
However, they grew more receptive to the prospect of two new gyms after learning of problems in preserving old gyms during new-school projects in Mosquero and Des Moines.
“Other projects have hit bumps in the road, and we want this to run smoothly,” San Jon superintendent Alan Umholtz said.
Formative Architecture principal architect Owen Kramme estimated the revised design of one new high-school gym and one new middle-school gym (with a regulation-size floor) would cost $3.3 million less than renovating San Jon’s two existing gyms.
Ryan Parks, PSFA’s deputy director, said the agency ordinarily would be receptive to renovating the existing gyms, but he acknowledged doing that “brings a lot of complications” due to drainage problems and other issues.
The basic design for San Jon’s all-new small school complex contained one gym and two locker rooms for the high school and middle school and an indoors play area for the elementary school.
Kramme said revisions to San Jon’s new school plan reflect “unique needs that the design standards don’t quite fit.”
San Jon officials advocated for two, full-size gyms for a variety of reasons.
Umholtz said physical-education classes for the high and middle schools are held simultaneously. He said gyms also are used for instructional purposes for science courses.
“Those gyms are used all day long,” he said.
Umholtz said having two gyms would be helpful in scheduling sports events when visiting schools bring both boys and girls teams. Because of a lack of referees in the area, San Jon often has to reschedule games to school days.
In addition to the school’s recent carnival, Umholtz said San Jon’s gyms also are used for the upcoming Veterans Day ceremony, Missoula Children’s Theatre, Farmers Electric Cooperative meeting and funerals.
Athletic director Bobby Kandel also recommended having a total of four locker rooms. He said having just two would be “not comforting as a parent” mixing high school and middle-school students.
Accentuating the point, board President Frank Gibson said he recalled being bullied as a boy and being a bully as an older student when the locker room mixed together a wide age range of boys.
Parks and Scott Ficklin, PSFA’s senior facilities manager, agreed with having separate locker rooms for middle-school and high-school students.
Parks said although San Jon’s revised design may require an additional 3,000 square feet or more, he said three other school-complex projects also had to increase their square footage, and all were approved.
He said San Jon and the agency can “meet in the middle” on the project.
“We’re not busting the bank, which is to be commended,” Parks said.
Parks advised having San Jon and Formative hammering out a design for a high school and middle-school gym before engineers examine it.
The final design for San Jon school is subject to final approval by the Public School Capital Outlay council.