The renovation project is to cost $37.9 million and the state will reimburse up to $30.1 million of that amount.
CHICOPEE – With the money now in place to convert the former Chicopee High School into a middle school, the renovation committee is starting to plan the next phase of the project.
“It looks like we are down to serious business since the City Council did approve the funding,” said William M. Zaskey, a councilor and chairman of the renovation committee.
In April the Massachusetts School Building Authority, officially agreed to reimburse the city 80 percent of the renovation costs up to $30.1 million, after years of slowly planning the project. Then this month the City Council agreed to borrow $37.9 million, which is the entire cost of the renovations.
Architects have already begun to draw detailed plans of the project. If all goes well a requests for bids for a contractor can go out in December with the hope work can be done and students moved in for September 2015.
The plan is to move students from Fairview Veterans Memorial Middle School, which is inadequate for children in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades, and then use the middle school building as a shared early childhood and elementary school.
“Our next chore will be to hire the construction manager,” said Norman Benjamin, of Arcadis who is serving as the owner's project manager for the renovation.
The construction manager will be responsible for day-to-day oversight of the building while the project manager oversees the entire building from the start of the project when an architect is hired to the finish.
He recommended the renovation committee form a four-person subcommittee that includes two members of the renovation committee, a representative from the architect and from his own company, to develop a list of qualifications.
The committee quickly and unanimously voted on two members to serve on the board.
After the qualifications are set the committee will then have to put out a request for managers and select one from resumes submitted, Benjamin said.
At the same time the state has selected a firm that will oversee the installation of all of the systems such as heating ventilation and air conditioning to ensure they are installed properly and are in working order. The state will cover the cost of that contract, he said.