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New PHS wing set for August completion
Published 3:33pm Tuesday, June 12, 2012By NEAL WAGNER / City Editor
A new, nine-classroom wing at Pelham High School is “on track” to be completed before classes resume on August 20, said Shelby County Schools Assistant Superintendent Tom Ferguson.
“Everything is on track to be completed by the end of the summer,” Ferguson said. “I actually drove by the other day, and everything is going great.”
The new nine-classroom wing, which is being built on the southwest corner of the PHS campus, was originally scheduled to be completed in October 2011.
However, the Shelby County School Board in November 2011 terminated its contract with the Columbus, Ga.-based D. Dean and Associates because of construction delays, Shelby County Schools spokeswoman Cindy Warner said previously.
In April, the Shelby County Board of Education announced the Pelham-based Williford Orman construction company had taken over the project. During the April meeting, Shelby County Schools Facility Coordinator Randy Reeves said the project completion date for the project is Aug. 9.
When completed, the new wing will help to alleviate overcrowding at the school, which had an enrollment of about 1,800 students. The school’s enrollment likely will be cut in half when Helena High School opens in the next few years, school officials said previously.
Shelby County Schools Superintendent Randy Fuller previously said classrooms in the new PHS wing could be used to house a culinary arts institute as part of the system’s “My Future” program. The My Future program is designed to prepare students for life after high school, and will be expanding into all county high schools over the next several years.
I feel like this money could have been better spent on a renovation of the school instead of an addition. The school will lose half it’s enrollment in about two years, meaning it will be built to house around 2000 students, and about 800 will be in attendance. Investing in a renovation of the entire school, especially the old building would have been a better use of tax dollars.
Pelham will grow again someday, but not at the rate it did in the past. The vacant land simply is not there. What is left is on the eastern side of the city around hwy 11, and many of the kids that live there in the future will be zoned for Chelsea schools.
What’s done is done, but it really didn’t make a lot of sense to do this addition.
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