LANSDALE — A new look for North Penn High School could be made public in September, along with chances for the public to see the reasons for planned renovations.
District officials have announced a series of tours of the current school, and the first chance for residents to see renderings of the plans.
“It will not be the full-fledged detail, and the imagery that you’ll see in a couple of months, but we do want to share it with the community in a couple of weeks,” said Superintendent Todd Bauer.
Since the start of the year, district staff and the school board have ramped up talks on the planned renovations to North Penn High School, to modernize and possibly expand the facility and upgrade and repair utilities that in places date back to the original school’s construction in the early 1970s.
Staff and the board have worked with district’s architect The Schrader Group to study traffic upgrades needed around the school, to present in February on recent equipment failures, give cost estimates in March for a planned new ninth-grade wing of the school and a revamp of the existing building and adjacent properties, and to seek bids from, then interview firms to act as the construction manager for that project.
A construction management firm was hired in early August, weeks after the district hosted an invite-only meeting in July to discuss site layouts with students and community members, and staff and the board continue to discuss timelines for a voter referendum needed to approve debt for a ninth grade addition.
During the school board’s facilities and operations committee meeting on Aug. 28, staff gave an update on steps since mid-August, including a second meeting featuring the invitation-only group of students, staff, administrators and residents who attended the July planning meeting.
“The attendees of the July workshop were invited back to the (high school) last Wednesday, and the Schrader Group rolled out the conceptual plan from that workshop. And the conceptual plan was received very positively,” Schneider said.
“The group was very encouraged and pleased to see what their ideas were. At this point, this is still maybe at 25,000 feet instead of 35,000, but we are moving toward trying to refine that design,” he said.
Based on feedback from those two meetings, Schneider told the committee, the architect is developing a schematic design that can be presented to the public sometime in September, then used to develop construction drawings that can be vetted by contractors as they seek formal bids, and can be used to derive an estimated project cost. Bauer added a late-breaking development: the architect will present at least part of their renderings at the school board’s Sept. 12 meeting.
“We are going to have the Schrader Group present to the full board, some of the images and some of the things that Mr. Schneider spoke to, at the September work session,” he said.
Committee chairwoman Cathy Wesley asked if the renderings and updated plans would also be posted on the district’s “Reimagine NPHS” site for public vetting, and Bauer said they would.
In a statement subsequent to the meeting, district staff announced a series of public tours of the high school for community members to “be more informed about the renovation conversations taking place while highlighting the facility needs” of the high school. All tours will be led by Pete Nicholson, the district’s Administrator of Secondary Education and Renovations and previously the high school’s principal, and will also feature members of the high school’s student government, according to the district.
Those tours will be offered from 6 to 7 p.m. on Sept. 5 and 19; Oct. 3, 17 and 31; Nov. 14 and 28; Dec. 12 and Jan. 9, 2024, and are free and open to the public with no pre-registration required beforehand, according to the district. Those with questions or seeking more information about the tours can contact Nicholson at nicholap@npenn.org.
Schneider added an update on another portion of the high school planning: staff have posted an RFP seeking proposals for a real estate broker to help the district find a new location for the district transportation center, the garage, vehicle storage area, dispatch center and propane fueling tank that are all currently located adjacent to the high school.
“The responses for this RFP are due September 8th, with interviews scheduled on the 13th, and a recommendation will be made for the board’s consideration on September 21st,” he said.
Board member Jonathan Kassa asked if those real estate brokerage firms were planning to refer to a high school concept with an addition for ninth grade or without the addition, and Schneider said both sets of plans include relocating the transportation facilities.
“Both option one and option two, be it the full renovation and addition to the 21st century high school – or the basic renovation of option two – have the transportation center relocating to a different property,” he said.
Resident Jason Lanier said he was still unclear on whether the architect would cover the costs of the special election, if the architect is paid more for a larger project and had an incentive to recommend the addition, and whether the voter referendum would allow the district to exceed the state-set Act 1 limit for an allowable tax increase each year, to cover the debt needed for the addition.
“This assumes that we will be raising to Act 1 for the foreseeable future. That’s the way I read it,” he said.
Bauer answered that, if the board proceeds with a special election, the district would be responsible for covering the costs, and said he saw no conflict of interest for the architect.
“Yes, an architect does make more money depending on the size of the project. But they are designing this project based upon input from us,” he said.
“We’ve had meetings after meetings over the last four or five years to come up with ideas and concepts and things that we would like to see. But the Schrader Group would support us either way — they are our architect, no matter what,” Bauer said.
North Penn’s school board next meets at 7 p.m. on Sept. 12 and 21 at the district Educational Services Center, 401 E. Hancock Street; for more information visit www.NPenn.org.
