CHARLESTON, W.Va.— The state School Building Authority awarded $65 million to a dozen West Virginia counties at their Tuesday morning meeting.
They originally had requests totaling $250 million from 30 different counties.
Kanawha County and Putnam County were among the counties awarded funding, both of which needed funding in order to start the process of getting a new school built.
Kanawha County was awarded over $20 million dollars; however, it has been broken into three installments of $6.7 million. The first installment will be fiscal year 2025, and then fiscal year 2026 and 2027.
Kanawha County Schools Superintendent Tom Williams says that it’s exciting.
Tom Williams, KCS Superintendent
“We are excited, we would close four of our smaller elementary schools,” Williams said. “And this money will allow us to build a new elementary school for the folks in the eastern end of the county.”
The new school will be built on the former Dupont Junior High School site and will hold approximately 600 Pre-k through fifth grade students. This came after the Kanawha County Board of Education and the state Board of Education voted to close Belle, Malden, Mary Ingles, and Midland Trail Elementary schools in October.
While the school closures were met with resistance from parents and students, Williams hopes that once they start the process and have something to show, they’ll come around.
“And I think once were able to get a rendering out there for folks to actually look like and see this is what out new school is going to look like,” he said. “Once you can look at it, it becomes real.”
Another county that received funding was Putnam County, who will use the funding to help build a new Hurricane Middle School.
The county previously got $75 million from the Putnam County bond that was passed in the November election. From the SBA they received over $25 million dollars but will be given $8.3 million over the course of three years.
Putnam County Schools Superintendent John Hudson says that when he got word about the funding, he was excited.
“It’s just a relief, but it just says so much about the community passing that bond with about a 65% passage rate,” Hudson said. “And this will allow Hurricane to get that new middle school.”
The new middle school will be built adjacent to Hurricane High School.
Hudson said he believes that moving the middle school to a new location will help elevate a lot of traffic at the new school and the old school.
“We believe that will ease congestion in that area, especially with the new on and off ramps coming between Hurricane and Milton,” he said. “But with the multiple entrances and exits and dedicated bus and parent loops at the new school, we think will make a different with traffic.”
He also said that it will help eliminate the distance between the high school and middle school, which helps the school bus travel.
John Hudson, PCS Superintendent
“Currently half of our buses go to the middle school, half to the high school,” Hudson said. “In the morning and evening, they go back and forth, so that should alleviate some of that.”
With both counties receiving funding, they have similar timelines to when their new schools should be completed.
For Putnam County, they already have contractors selected for the project, so they can go ahead and start the planning phase, which according to Hudson should take eight to 12 months.
“All the planning for the architects to get the design and everything to go, and the site work will begin sometime during that period and the school will get the contractors. The school should be up and running, if I’m understanding correctly within three years,” Hudson said.
Williams said that right now they need to select a contractor for the project, which could take a couple of months.
“We’ll start advertising for an architect, probably within the next week or so,” Hudson said. “And the time its south for two weeks, then they do the selection. It will probably be in the beginning of February because we have the holidays coming up.”