Athens to break ground on new high school in June

ATHENS — City school officials will have their first bid opening for the new Athens High School on June 6, Superintendent Trey Holladay said.

Holladay said at least eight companies have expressed interest in bidding for moving dirt at the site, the subject of the first bid opening, and he is optimistic the school system will get good prices.

An official groundbreaking has not been set, but Holladay said he anticipates crews will begin moving dirt sometime in June at the site on the west side of U.S. 31, north of the school system’s central office.

Rather than bid out the entire project at once, Holladay said school officials will bid the construction job in multiple smaller projects, hoping to garner the best overall price. The smallest bids, such as furnishings and landscaping, could come after most of the construction is done.

The Athens Board of Education already has awarded a contract for Martin & Cobey Construction Co., of Athens, to serve as construction manager on the project at a fee of 2.75 percent of the total cost. That’s about $1.2 million to $1.4 million for Martin & Cobey, Holladay said.

The bid prices will determine whether the school system can build certain add-on items, including a new auditorium that is included only as an option to be completed if funding allows.

The city has borrowed $55 million through a bond issue to be repaid through existing tax dollars, mostly from revenue that already goes to the school system. The money will pay for the new school and other infrastructure improvements throughout the school system.

The loan more than doubles the city’s debt burden, but city officials are lauding the new school as the biggest economic driver for the city in decades.

District 2 Councilman Harold Wales said Friday he believes the new school will help attract young families to a growing city of roughly 24,000 residents during a time when Limestone County leads the state in new job announcements.

“I think it will be a huge economic driving force,” he said.

Mayor Ronnie Marks expressed a similar sentiment, saying he agreed with comments made by Huntsville Mayor Tommy Battle during a Rotary meeting Friday.

“He said if we’re not keeping up with the things going on around us, then we’re going backward,” Marks said.

The new school is slated to be ready for the 2017-18 school year.

evan.belanger@decaturdaily.com or 256-340-2439. Twitter @evanbelanger.