The Board of Education of Jefferson City Public Schools received updates on the district's two high school projects, including the projects' cost and more detailed visual renderings of interiors and exteriors.
Project leaders from The Architects Alliance, ACI Boland, DLR Group and Nabholz Construction were at the meeting to show a presentation of slides that portrayed design renderings more as photos and less as the sketch-types previously seen - complete with photographed people and objects placed into the frames for scale, depth and a sense of the use of the spaces shown.
The renovation of Jefferson City High School and construction of Capital City High School are expected to be fully completed by January 2020.
CCHS is still planned to be open in August 2019 for its first students, but it won't be until closer to the end of the first students' first semester that some spaces, including the school's main and auxiliary gyms, will be completed.
JCPS Superintendent Larry Linthacum acknowledged at the board meeting that fall sports such as volleyball in the first semester of CCHS will have to be held at other sites, including the district's middle schools.
The Architects Alliance's Principal Architect Cary Gampher said designers have also been conscious that as they plan the outdoor athletic practice fields at the CCHS site, they are taking into consideration that those practice fields may eventually be used as competitive spaces.
"We knew that those requests would eventually come, and so we wanted to make the practice fields we put in now, when they turn into competition fields, (with) the larger crowds there, the infrastructure's in place or can be put in place so we don't have to redo any work that's been done," Gampher said.
Such future improvements to athletic fields at the new school could include having eight tennis courts instead of the planned four; a seating structure for football and soccer fans and concessions; a softball field instead of just a baseball field; and additional parking around these areas, according to one overview rendering.
Linthacum cautioned, though, that such additions are not included in what will be finished for the school's opening, and could be other projects years down the road. Board member Lindsey Rowden referred to the future athletic projects off-handedly as a "wish list."
JCPS chief financial and operating officer Jason Hoffman shared that as of April 20, the total budget for the two high school projects is projected to be $141,302,718 - about $47.1 million of which is for the renovation of JCHS, and another $68.9 million for the construction of CCHS, for a total construction budget of $121,055,297.
The remainder of the total cost is from contingency sums, payment for architects and engineers, furniture and fixtures, and other miscellaneous costs such as asbestos abatement at JCHS that's set to start in a few days.
The rough total estimate for both projects given in April 2017 was $130 million, and that number has incrementally grown as more estimates become actual bids - especially at JCHS, where the original estimate was $36.75 million; it was $68.25 million originally projected at CCHS.
However, Hoffman added the district still stands as of April 20 to have a revenue from the projects of $1,917,753, as a result of premiums and interest received on the bonds that have been issued to pay for the projects - so the projects are still under budget, in other words.