School Board and Architects Introduce County Commission to Proposed New Elementary School Plan (View Plan Here)

October 30, 2022
By: Dwayne Page

For the first time, members of the DeKalb County Commission Thursday night were shown plans for a proposed new 800 student Pre-K to 2nd grade elementary school to replace the existing Smithville Elementary complex.

(Click link below to view plan)

School Plans

The joint meeting between the County Commission, Board of Education, County Mayor, Director of Schools, and Upland Design Group of Crossville, the Architect of the project was held in an informal work session at the auditorium of the Mike Foster Multipurpose Center.

An updated rendering, schematic site, and floor plan were unveiled as to what a new Smithville Elementary School campus would look like, and representatives of Upland Design took questions from the commissioners.

“I thought it was a really informative meeting. The school board had a very good presentation,” said County Mayor Matt Adcock after the workshop.

Although the Board of Education has settled on the plan, it may be months before the County Commission decides whether to fund it. In the meantime, County Mayor Adcock said he has asked CTAS County Government Consultant Ben Rodgers to conduct a debt study for the county before action is taken.

“I want him (Rodgers) to do this study to give us what our options are and what resources we could use to fund something like this. They (CTAS) need somewhat of a firm number to do a debt study, so I have asked them to do a debt study for $50 million. We would definitely have to find some revenue source to fund it,” said County Mayor Adcock.

Director of Schools Patrick Cripps said after the meeting that he thought the workshop was productive.

“We just wanted to get the school plan out there for everybody to see because we are all going to have to work together to get this project going in the right direction. I would like to see us get started on the project whenever they (county) get their debt study done but there are a lot of steps to do. This is just a preliminary sketch of the building, and we still have to do some more surveys, permit work and things of that nature. We just wanted to introduce the plan to them (commissioners) and let them see what we would like to see going forward. It’s the first step of many,” said Director Cripps.

The existing Smithville Elementary School, originally built in 1958, now is 70,557 square feet in size, and has a current enrollment of 581 students. As far back as 2017, a facilities study by Upland Design Group, concluded that the school, which has mold and other concerns, should be replaced and repurposed for other uses.

The current estimated project cost to build a new Smithville Elementary School is $46,199,875.

“The building construction cost has been based on current industry standards school construction in today’s economic market and recently bid school projects. We have used Park View Elementary in Putnam County and Jasper Middle School in Marion County as references to determine the estimated cost. Both have recently bid in the last 60 days,” said Brian Templeton, Architect and Firm Principal of Upland Design Group.

“We started planning for the project in 2018 prior to COVID and since then construction costs have really been volatile and it’s been a hard thing to pin down but the way we get ideas about costs is we look at other projects and we gauge the cost per square foot of a school. At the end of June and early July Putnam County bid a new school project and it just started construction. That project bid roughly $330 per square foot and a couple of weeks later we got some information on a middle school project in Marion County that had bid around $340 per square foot but those projects had pretty expensive sites so talking to the contractors there and trying to determine what the cost of building was versus site we were able to come up with what we are presenting to you right here for this project (Smithville Elementary) of about $325 per square foot for the building and that would include site work. This is what we think the project would cost if we bid it today. Just to put that into perspective, the contractors we have spoken with and the construction prices we have seen indicate that over the last 18 months there has been a little over a one percent increase per month in inflation in the construction industry. A couple of years ago it was 2% a year. When we first started talking about this a few years ago it was about $200 per square foot. This is the best cost information we have at this time. That is not to say that it could not change but there is no sign right now of the commercial market taking a dive,” said Templeton.

When asked how long it would take to build a new elementary school, Templeton said about three years. “To produce it I think it’s about a three-year period. Before you can get it to contract, before getting the drawings done to get it out to bid it’s about six to eight months and then I would estimate about 24 months for construction,” said Templeton.

The project budget estimate as presented by Upland Design Group is as follows:

*Building & Sitework 124,207 square feet x $325 per square foot: $40,367,275

*Additional bus and car drives to connect the two schools (New SES and Northside Elementary)- 10,000 square yards $550,000

*Survey-$29,600

*Additional Subsurface Investigation- $10,000

*Construction Testing- $125,000

*Construction Contingency- $1,000,000

*Architectural & Engineering Fees- $2,045,000

*Final Printing: $3,000

*Fire Marshal Review Fee: $70,000

*Loose Furniture/IT & AV Equipment: $2,000,000

*Playground: Not Included

Total Estimated Project Cost: $46,199,875

More than two years ago the school board voted to allocate funds from its own budget to purchase 24.5 acres of property on North Congress Boulevard adjacent to Northside Elementary School for construction of a new Pre-K to 2nd grade elementary school. The price paid was $18,000 per acre for a total of $441,000.

The purchase was made after a favorable core drill assessment of the property and TDOT approval of a traffic plan into the proposed new school off Highway 56 north.

According to Upland Design Group, the proposed new Pre-K to 2 Smithville Elementary School would be 124,207 square feet in size and would be designed to accommodate 800 students with room for future expansion to house up to 300 additional students (1,100) total. The school would be built with 11 classrooms for each grade level of kindergarten, first, and second grade (33 classrooms for 20 students each) along with seven Pre-K classrooms for 20 students each plus four CDC/SPED classrooms as needed. The future expansion would accommodate 15 new classrooms at 20 students each. There would be 189 parking spaces on the campus.

In September 2020 the School Board adopted a traffic plan as proposed by T-Square Engineering based in Franklin and approved by TDOT on how best to get traffic entering the schools off of Highway 56 to reduce congestion.

Under the plan each school (The proposed new Smithville Elementary School and Northside Elementary) would have its own entrance for car traffic off of Highway 56 (North Congress Boulevard) but there would also be a lane connecting the two schools should parents have to pick up and drop off children at both places.

Buses would enter the Northside campus from Smith Road for student pickup/drop off and then would follow a bus (only) lane to the new elementary school for pickup/drop off to be located at the rear of both schools. After making a turnaround at the new school, buses would then exit the same way they entered via the bus lane and then back onto Smith Road.

No construction or alterations will be needed on Highway 56 to accommodate the school traffic plan according to T-Square Engineering.

October 31, 2022
By: Dwayne Page

Homes for the holidays!

The DeKalb Animal Shelter would like to find for their furry friends homes in time for the holidays including “Bunny” the WJLE/DeKalb Animal Shelter featured “Pet of the Week”

“Bunny is our little eight-month-old Lab mix. She is a lap dog, super sweet, and happy. Bunny loves everybody and loves to play. She gets along with other dogs and has been fully vetted and micro-chipped,” said Shelter Director Emmaly Bennett.

“Visit our website at https://www.dekalbanimalsheltertn.com/ to see Bunny’s picture, fill out an adoption application and we will call you to come in and meet her,” said Bennett.

The shelter is open Monday-Friday from 8 to 4 and Saturday from 8 to 12 at 186 Transfer Station Road.

October 30, 2022
By: Dwayne Page

A total of 1,695 people has cast ballots in DeKalb County to date with two more days left of early voting for the State and Federal November 8 elections.

Times for early voting at the courthouse through November 3 are as follows: Wednesday 9 a.m. to 1 p.m.; and Thursday 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. The hours for voting at the 12 precincts on Election Day, November 8th are 8 a.m. until 7 p.m.

The daily breakdown of early voting for this election in DeKalb County is as follows:

Wednesday, October 19- 149 (113 in person and 36 by absentee)
Thursday, October 20- 142 (140 in person and 2 by absentee)
Friday, October 21- 140 (138 in person and 2 by absentee)
Saturday, October 22- 91 (90 in person and 1 by absentee)
Monday, October 24- 122 (110 in person and 12 by absentee)
Tuesday, October 25- 148 (146 in person and 2 by absentee)
Wednesday, October 26- 116 (100 in person and 16 by absentee or assisted living centers)
Thursday, October 27- 215 (152 in person and 12 by absentee in Smithville and 51 in person at the fairgrounds in Alexandria)
Friday, October 28- 160 (152 in person and 8 by absentee)
Saturday, October 29-139 (119 in person and 29 by absentee or NHC Healthcare Center)

Monday, October 31-129 (114 in person and 15 by absentee

Tuesday, November 1-144 (139 in person and 6 by absentee)

Voters will be making their selections for Governor, Congressman and State Representative and voters in the 4th district only will have a candidate for Constable to fill an unexpired term. In addition, voters will be making their choices on four constitutional amendments.

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