Heights B.O.E. considers relocating weight room

Moving the weight room at Jackson Heights High School to a new building could give the school two more classrooms to work with, as the Jackson Heights USD 335 Board of Education noted during its regular monthly meeting on Monday.

But before the board can approve construction of a new building for weight training and free up more classroom space, the issue of water getting into the existing weight room has to be resolved and more information is needed on how much a new weight room building will cost — as well as how the district will pay for it.

At Monday’s meeting, middle and high school principal Derek Smith talked with board members about the possibility of having a new weight room building constructed on the Jackson Heights district campus, whether it would be at the north end of the JHHS football field as board members discussed at their May 6 meeting or south of the high school building as Smith said has also been suggested.

Board members noted during the May meeting that a $294,250 estimate had been received from Morton Buildings for construction of a “rough finish” building without electric or water utilities, but asked for more bids. It was also suggested that room might be available in the district’s bus barn for the weight room.

“Unless we have somewhere to put it, it needs to stay where it is,” Smith said, adding that an issue with water leaking into the weight room also needed to be fixed and  that an area roofer would visit the school this week to look at and possibly repair a cracked roof seal.

Once the water leak is repaired, there would be “no reason why we couldn’t turn that (weight room) into two functioning classrooms,” Smith said, relaying a suggestion from athletic director Brad Alley to the board.

Smith also presented board members with a new quote for construction of a new weight room building that would be located just south of the southernmost light pole at the football field — “about a 20-foot walk from the ag shop” at JHHS, Smith said — and in addition to providing a new space for weights, it would also give sports programs at JHHS additional storage space.

How to pay for a new weight room building was another matter altogether, as board members suggested either asking district patrons to approve a “small bond” or utilizing existing capital outlay funds. Regarding the latter suggestion, District Superintendent Jim Howard said that it could possibly be done, although he noted that “it’d be a pretty big hit to our cash balances.”

Board clerk Sheri Dibbern agreed with Howard on the latter suggestion, noting that the district hasn’t yet started receiving additional state aid from its increased enrollment this year due to the influx of students from the former Wetmore Attendance Center and adding that covering it with existing funds was “not feasible with the current budget that we have.”

Another suggestion for covering the cost of building a new weight room facility came from board member David Holliday, who recommended the district consider a lease-purchase agreement that could be spread out over a few years.

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