South Range schools must find new site for district’s office

Staff report

NORTH LIMA

The South Range Board of Education has approved selling the North Lima board office and must move it by Aug. 27.

Superintendent Dennis Dunham said the board agreed last week to sell the office, which has been in use for the past six years, and the property to Lindy Paving for $225,000.

The sale does not include the football stadium or the property on which it sits, and the field will remain the site of high school football games this fall, Dunham said.

The office will be moved temporarily to a district-owned farmhouse on state Route 46 across from the K-12 South Range complex, he said.

“The intent was to sell the board office and relocate permanently to the farmhouse. Since then [2009], the funding for the tunnel [under Route 46] has come through and the farm house has to be moved as part of that project,” Dunham said.

In February, the school board learned that funding had been secured through Eastgate Regional Council of Governments for a $1.6 million project to add two left-turn lanes and a pedestrian tunnel under Route 46. The project is scheduled for construction in 2014, according to Vindicator files.

The farmhouse must be moved or torn down so that the tunnel can be installed. It hasn’t been determined whether the board will move the farmhouse, add the district office to the K-12 complex or choose another option, Dunham said.

“We really need to go through the numbers and determine what’s cost-effective and feasible,” Dunham said.

An athletic facility consisting of locker and weight rooms recently opened south of the K-12 complex, and an all-weather track was installed on the other side of Route 46, serving as the starting point to a sports complex.

“By bid savings and other Locally Funded Initiative money, we were able to take care of it and to at least put the athletic facility in,” Dunham said.

This fall, varsity boys and girls soccer and middle school football teams will play games for the first time on the field enclosed by the new track, he said.

“We’ll play Friday night football in North Lima for the foreseeable future until there’s funding for a stadium to go around the all-weather track at the sports complex,” Dunham said.