Belpre City Schools approves firm to design new building
An artist rendition of what the new consolidated school could look like for Belpre City Schools. The football field and gymnasium can be seen in the back of the photo and would remain part of the facility. (File Photo)
BELPRE — The Belpre City School District selected Fanning Howey Associates Inc. as the architectural firm to lead the design and planning of the district’s new school building during the board’s regular meeting Thursday. “The board was pleased to be able to vote formally on Fanning Howey being the architectural firm for the project,” Superintendent Jeff Greenley said. He said the selection came after a competitive bidding process. “We received four bids. Our evaluation committee reviewed those bids, had teleconference interviews with several of the firms, and ultimately decided on Fanning Howey,” Greenley said. He said the firm is no stranger to the community, having previously worked on the district’s pre-bond efforts. “They should be somewhat familiar to residents. It was the entity that did the pre-bond work. So they’re the ones that hosted the community meetings, gathered the feedback on LFIs (locally funded initiatives) and made the renderings that just appeared in the last cycle,” Greenley said. “They are also the architectural firm that did the Warren Local School District job. So they have some familiarity in the area. They’ve learned a lot about local contractors, they’ve learned a lot about just how things in the county work. And we think that, in addition to this, their body of work made them the right choice for this project.” Greenley said Fanning Howey’s responsibilities will include working with the district and the Ohio Facilities Construction Commission to finalize plans and facilitate community input sessions as the project moves forward. Greenley said the new building is being designed to accommodate all the students it needs to, with an eye toward future growth. “We are building the building for about 1,100 students, right? So our current enrollment right now is somewhere around 900. … we’d like to make sure it’s right sized,” Greenley said. “It’s difficult, because we’re trying to build a building in 2025 that we’ll use in 2075 and beyond. So we just want to make sure that the community doesn’t get to a point where they need to put even more money into it.” He said the construction will take place on the former bowling alley property by the school that was recently acquired by the board, minimizing disruption to students. “All of that property now has been acquired. It’s in place, and we’ll be able to build the building without disrupting the academic work of students,” Greenley said. “Once the building is constructed, we’ll move kids over, and then we’ll demo the existing high school space, and then that will make space for the phase two elementary school building, which can also be built without interrupting academics.” He said community input will also play a key role as the design process moves forward. “This fall, Fall ’25, will be the visioning and design process where residents and stakeholders can work with us to figure out and finalize the design of the building itself,” Greenley said. “We will be providing monthly updates at board meetings, so the public’s more than welcome to come to our meetings on the third Thursdays of every month at 5 p.m. They can monitor our social media channels, our website and we’ll be making announcements for committees.” He said the district also plans to host virtual town halls, which they have done in the past. “So you’ll probably see us use those again,” Greenley said. “We know folks are busy and it’s usually hard to come out during the evenings, and so you absolutely may see us use virtual town halls at the major, critical milestone moments. So folks can get clear information, and we can receive rapid feedback from folks.” He said although the district will scale back on some of the improvements to the current buildings, safety remains a top priority during the transition. “We did go ahead and move forward with the key fobs that we felt was a need,” Greenley said. “We got a safety grant that’s also paid for some additional ability to screen visitors with driver’s licenses… So folks can expect to see a little bit of enhanced security when they arrive to sign a child out, or to be a visitor, just to make sure that everything is appropriate.” He said the roof on the elementary school will also see some work done but would not receive a whole new roof as planned. Greenley said he was excited to begin the process and looks forward to the new addition in the Belpre community. “It’s fun to get some of these initial milestones out of the way,” Greenley said. “And we’ll continue to chip away and make sure that the community’s investment is put to sound use.”