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CURRENT UP TO DATE INFO on the NEW Multi Purpose Gym , Baseball and Softball Fields BOND Projects.


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https://lufkindailynews.com/coronavirus/article_a0ed7898-99fd-11ea-9094-7b602fb13f5f.html

Lufkin trustees discuss work on bond, construction projects

 

Lufkin school trustees on Tuesday discussed movements on bond construction and contract renewals during its regular meeting.

Superintendent Lynn Torres said there was a second meeting of contractors at Lufkin Middle School last week, and bids are coming due this week to Berry & Clay Construction, the district’s construction manager for the multi-purpose facility and the middle school bond projects, and a guaranteed maximum price is expected soon.

 

“We are walking and looking at the first part of the building that will be pulled down in the back of the campus,” Torres said. “We have removed most of the movable items, there’s still a few to go. We’re now looking at that particular building with an eye for salvage and for passing down.”

The district will attempt to save items like water fountains, lights, basketball goals, flooring, etc. for other campuses to use, and they will be partnering with a local entity with “an eye for auctioning and salvaging,” Torres said.

“We will be in the business of allowing that to happen and recouping some money as we move forward before we just bulldoze the building,” she said. “We’re preparing all of that, and we are anxious to hopefully start construction on some of that this summer.”

The district is continuing to plan for upcoming instruction as regulations are loosened or added because of COVID-19. Gov. Greg Abbott announced on Monday that districts are allowed to have in-person summer school, and board member Don Mulbach asked how LISD was planning on addressing this announcement.

“We are looking at that, and at this time we’re not anticipating having a mass in-school summer school,” she said. “It’s just not going to be something that works. However, we’ll still be offering online instruction for the high school where they can have credit recovery, credit advancement and dual credit opportunities.

‘‘Remember that in all grades, K through eighth, we have actually sent home all of their consumable textbook materials that have not been used for the last nine weeks, and so they will have summer program, and most teachers are including a guide for home use of what those curriculum materials are.”

An individual campus might be able to make the summer school work for students who need an extra head start, but it would be too big of an obstacle for the district to bring in en masse, Torres said.

“We are, however, looking at that guidance very closely because we feel that’s going to be a window of what our fall of 2020-21 is going to look like, as well, if we don’t get some relief from the spread of this disease,” she said. “We’re putting a critical eye to that because we’re trying to anticipate if that becomes the norm for the next school year, what are we going to do.”

Additionally, the high school has been through a full day of videoing for the hybrid graduation ceremony, and it has been going well, Torres said.

“We are one day in to the hybrid graduation ceremony, and the results and the comments from the parents and the students have been very positive about the event,” she said. “It’s been a very intimate type setting for the graduates to celebrate their graduation with their families. It’s been a good day.”

The board also passed renewing contacts with insurance companies and with the Beth and Horace Stubblefield Learning Center. Tim Hobbs, district purchasing and risk management coordinator, presented the contacts with Texas Kids First and the Texas Association of School Boards Risk Management Fund for student athletic insurance and property, liability and auto insurance.

Hobbs said each contract increased from last year. Board member Hall Henderson asked why the price continued to increase after the sharp increase from last year, and Hobbs said that was normal across the state.

However, he also said TASB Risk Management Fund had little competition because of its deductible. Board members approved the renewal of the contracts but said they would like to look at a different method of obtaining contracts to give more companies a chance to bid.

Torres said they are continuing to look at updates regarding legislation like House Bill 3 and the Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act.

“We’re paying attention, and we’ll know more as we move through the summer,” Torres said.

Grace Juarez's email address is grace.juarez@lufkindailynews.com.

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No updates discussed on the current progress of the New Multi Purpose Gym and the Baseball/Softball Complex.

I haven't been out there in a couple of weeks.  Hope they have gotten closer to finishing the concrete foundations , drainage system and maybe the lighting piers.  The weather is due to be very good the next couple of weeks.   Looking forward to seeing the structures when they start going into the air.

Still hoping for some integration between the new multi purpose gym complex design and Abe Martin complex.  It is just going to look strange and odd, if Abe does not have a little something of the new aesthetics that are included in the new multi purpose complex.  Marshall is spending big dollars improving their athletic facilities without bond money.  I mean big changes in all areas of their athletic facilities.  Have been very impressed to see how they are getting these improvements done. They have been very proactive as a district the last two or three years.

More pictures later in the week when they get their graduation out of the way, it maybe next week before I try to get back out.  All good and we should start to see more progress once they get the critical foundations all secure.

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All of these new additions to the Lufkin High campus will be awesome when completed.  The new Multi-Purpose facility ( New Gym) and the new baseball/Softball complex and the additions to the Tennis Complex.

It's crazy they had to label a new GYM a Multi Purpose Facility to get it passed on the Bond with the new Middle School,. That's is how it is done in Lufkin.

As good as these additions will be, its no secret this should have been done 10-12 years ago when John Outlaw was pushing for all sports  to be consolidated together on one campus.  Roy Knight and the school board at that time just did not get that accomplished before John passed away.

When we get our current projects complete, we still will have issues at Abe Martin regarding a press box and ADA deficiencies and our Indoor Practice facility, that is 15 years old and only has a 60 yard long field, probably needs some work.  That building has been well used by every LHS sport, even Diboll and Huntington football have been allowed to use it in bad weather.  Maybe the band has practiced a time or two in there as well.  It was one of the best 15 years ago, now it probably needs an update.

JT and Tyler Lee and Marshal are all building 120 yard long Indoor or Cover turf field practice facilities with 60 ft tall roof.  Nacogdoches and Marshall are doing major renovations to their current basketball gyms.  Marshall is getting new turf on their football field, baseball and softball fields.  Nacogdoches is gearing up for several major athletic projects.  

It won't be long before Lufkin's new  projects will just mirror what everyone else has done.  JT and Tyler Lee were given about $90M each for their renovations from a 2017 Bond.  Both are building long overdue athletic complexes and indoor fields for practice.  Both have been working out of some very out dated sports facilities. 

Very thankful for the new projects at Lufkin High school, estatic even.  They are going to be awesome.  Much needed.  Let's keep it up and continue to improve ALL of the athletic facilities on campus and I'm talking the football stadium, which is the biggest money making sports on campus.  The pavement walking into that stadium looks like crap, with huge cracks everywhere and needed fixing 10 years ago.  The fencing is old , main gates are misaligned and rusted.  The Press box we all know about,  no discussion needed there.    My hope is those things are being addressed in some way very soon.   Go Pack!

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The final say was up to the school board and the AD,  all agreed to reduce the baseball /softball complex building by 2600 sq ft. from the original proposed plans by the architects.  Reducing a plan to meet budgets is not uncommon at all with most plan proposal.   Much of that is the two concession stands and some of that area will now be covered,  but open to the outside.  The architects submitted a plan that would have cost the district $7-8M and they had only budgeted $5.25 of the bond money for that project. Architects know this going in and come in with a top of the line lay out, knowing some will be cut, but hope to keep a little extra.  It's about makes them extra add on money..  

The original multi purpose lay out was 99,000 sq ft.  They cut that down to 45,000 sq ft, then went back and added 23,200 sq. ft., that added the practice floor to the complex, making the grand total of 68,200 sq ft.  .  So, the expense for the multi purpose went to $13.6M , over the $9.5M budgeted in the bond. a $4.1M additional cost.   Hope I'm explaining this clearly.  So, the district will pay the extra $$$ for the Multi Purpose either out of the general fund or with $$$ left over from a previous bond.   

Amway, here is how the school board, architects and the AD explained it all in The Lufkin Daily News:

 

Goodwin, Lasiter and Strong's new proposed plan is 6,923 square feet, 2,600 square feet less than the original plans. It would cost somewhere around $7-8 million. The fields were originally estimated to be 7% of the $75 million bond or $5.25 million.

Mark Strong and Hudson Henderson said they compressed rooms, reduced interior corridors and opened more of the facility to the outside to cut as much square footage as possible.

“When we first started cutting things, we were taking a red pen to the plan,” Henderson said. “After the conversations we had, and on this revision, I didn’t take a red pen. I took a pair of scissors.”

While these changes still allow for everything a student athlete should need, the changes will be felt, Henderson said. Things are smaller, things are different, rooms are missing, hallways are missing.

“One of the big things we did — I know there was some big debate in the past about whether there should be one concession stand or two — you’ll notice concession stands are no longer a part of this building,” Henderson said. “The storage rooms that are underneath the press boxes at each field will now serve as the concession stands.”

Athletic Director Todd Quick told the board this plan looked good — the students could deal with smaller facilities. His concern was making sure they kept the integrity of the turf fields.

“Our main concern was the turf because that’s where we’re going to spend about 99% of our time,” Quick said. “Very little time is going to be spent in here.”

The general consensus of the board seemed to be that this was the most they could cut from the plan, and they needed to go with it and get it out for bid for a guaranteed maximum price.

“We’re going to spend forever if we don’t nail it down,” board member Hall Henderson said. “At this point, I think we’ve reached the point of the integrity of the project.”

“These are your minimum necessities to maintain a baseball/softball complex,” Hudson Henderson said.

 

 

 

 

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Stephen Berry with Berry & Clay Construction, construction manager for the multipurpose facility and the middle school projects, discussed a potential guaranteed maximum price for the multipurpose facility.

The anticipated price was $215 per square foot. However, thanks to quite a few bids that came in, the price came out to $208.14, he said.

The original square footage was set at 45,000, but the current total is 65,200 square feet. Clay said that after he spoke with those who would be using it, the additional space was determined necessary to properly serve students.

“The building is actually 20,000 square feet bigger than the bond, but that was more or less because we added an auxiliary gym to the back and we increased it so we could have cross court,” Clay said. “These were all things that the district as a group felt was best for the overall use of the facility.”

Superintendent Lynn Torres and several board members commented, pointing out the need and thanking the company for approaching the building plans in the way they did.

“I don’t think people realize how gym-short we actually are currently at the high school with just the purple and the gold gym and having to run adaptive P.E., P.E. classes, drill team, cheerleading and so forth,” Torres said. “This actually puts us in a better position.”

“We’re gym poor, and from a functionality standpoint, our high school doesn’t operate well, and won’t, for game nights, especially tournaments, if we don’t do the facility in the way it’s designed now,” trustee Hall Henderson said.

The design process began by asking all involved for everything in their wildest dreams. That resulted in a design that was 99,000 square feet. Then the designers scaled back and scaled back until they couldn’t scale anymore unless they wanted to take away from the students’ experience, Clay said.

“I appreciate the fact that ya’ll went to the people who were going to be using it and said, what’s your wildest dream?” member Allison Langston said. “Now let’s edit that dream to what we need to have, functionally, to make this work for our students and our coaches and everybody involved.”

The total price of the project comes out to $13.6 million. Local companies will receive $3.8 million for their work on the project.

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  • 2 weeks later...

The construction is progressing.  The have poured the concrete foundation and rises for the softball and baseball field, where the seating will be located.  There are two large crews working.  Drainage work is almost ready for the next phase.  I believe  there will be substaintial progress over the next 60 days and the ball fields will start to take shape.  Exciting to see the progress happening every 2 or 3 days.

Same with the multi purpose work.  They have the steel in the air with roof stanchions attached.  Lot of welding going  Looks like the first layer of metal roofing is being installed.  The plumbing they have been working on for  2 months is finally finished on the west side .  For some reason, the plumbing and the foundation beam work, in that end of  foundation took a very long time to complete.   No guess why,  just may have been a more detailed situation.   

Will get more pictures when there is visibly more to look at than what we posted previously.   They have a good size crew working the iron and they are not wasting any time getting things done.  At the current rate, the entire metal framework, rood and some of the outside walls should be up before the 1st of September.   The interior work to finish will take the longest.  

The school has said the project should be completed by December.  Important to get everything dried in soon.  That helps to avoid any weather delays in the fall.

 

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The photo provided by Langston Construction is a drone shot of the construction site at Lufkin High School. The ball fields project is part of the $75 million dollar bond project and will include baseball and softball fields, along with concessions, restrooms, and dressing rooms.

 

Kevin Langston, President and CEO of Langston Construction, said, “The ball fields are coming along nicely. We have poured the foundation for the field house and the foundation for the softball grandstands and press box. We are working on the foundation for the baseball grandstands and press box.”

http://www.lufkinisd.org/2020/06/15/lhs-ball-fields-taking-shape/

According to Langston, the site has been cleared and rough graded and the detention pond is almost complete. The site utilities including water, sewer and electricity are being installed. The CMU block has begun for the softball grandstands, and a concrete crew started working on the bridge crossing.

drone-pic.jpg

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Great progress being made on the Multi Purpose.  By our first home game against Nacogdoches on October 2nd. , that structure is going to be an impressive sight from the stands.

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http://www.lufkinisd.org/2020/06/24/board-approves-lufkin-middle-school-guaranteed-maximum-price-ready-to-break-ground-at-lms/?fbclid=IwAR36OI3RdlewEF2UUFsuMcOF64bmwQ_Yc7O2NNZY2pxajArF0-amM3ZPMSc

It looks like they will save $8 Million under the proposed $60 Million original plan.  They are spending $5.25 Million on the Baseball/Softball Complex and $13.6 Million on the Multi-Purpose Facility.  Total of $18.85 Million for both projects.     $52M plus $18.85M  equals  $70.85 Million.  That leaves $4.15M of the 2018 BOND  to spend elsewhere.  

FRONT-ENTRANCE-Copy-1-12.2.20.jpg

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My hope is that the new Multi-Purpose project at the high school will include new matching fencing around the whole Abe Martin Complex and updated driveways, around and leading out on the backside of the parking lot. Hope the district will consider using the extra $4M for a new free standing Press Box with an elevator and cat walk built in front to access the stands. Not touching the stands of course. Get rid of those 1970s and step up 47 years.  I can see the whole lay out in my mind right now. 

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  • 3 weeks later...

The Multi-Purpose is continuing to expand.  More steel going up, the raised seating sections are installed on three sides, until they get the crane out of the middle.  The block wall is going up on the secondary/practice section of the gym.    By the time Lufkin actually plays a football game this year, the folks will see how the whole complex has come together.  Lots going on out there, $13.6 Million dollars at work.

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https://www.ktre.com/2020/07/21/lufkin-isd-progress-is-visible-all-construction-bond-projects/

Two years after voters approved a $75 million bond, Lufkin Independent School District continues the work on three major projects.

Construction crews are working hard to build the new multipurpose complex at Lufkin High School.

“You can go by there and see that the foundation is down. You see steel going up, so you can actually see the structure of the building as it’s coming up,” said Kurt Stephens, Deputy Superintendent at Lufkin ISD.

Stephens says things are shaping up at the baseball and softball complex, as well.

“They are working on some roadways and the parking lot. Creek crossing will be between that complex and the football stadium. As well as foundation and walls are starting to go up in the field house,” said Stephens. “There is some foundational work that has been completed at both fields, as to backstops and stands and things of those nature.”

With demolition is underway, Stephens says they will be getting a new timeline on Lufkin Middle School.

“Some of the completion dates were impacted somewhat by COVID-19, more so along the line of materials and supplies and being able to get those things delivered,” said Stephens. “Actually, from the standpoint of spring and summer has probably made accessibility by the construction companies easier, just because there hasn’t been traffic of anything they have to work around on the campuses.”

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  • 3 weeks later...

OSHA is investigating the death of a construction worker at Lufkin High School on Thursday.

Several calls went out to 911 operators detailing the emergency at 8 a.m. Thursday.

“I have a man who has collapsed, he’s unresponsive, at Lufkin High School,” said an unidentified caller to a 911 operator. “He’s being given CPR at this time. He’s not breathing.”

https://www.ktre.com/2020/08/11/worker-lufkin-high-school-construction-site-dies-prompting-federal-investigation/

The caller directed the operator to the site of construction around the back entrance of the high school.

The caller identified the patient as a 45-year-old Hispanic male who had been unconscious for about five minutes before the call. The operator asked several times what happened, but no one responded.

The operator transferred the caller to Regional EMD so they could instruct them how to handle the situation until emergency responders could reach them.

Chauntra Rideaux from the Office of Public Affairs at the OSHA Dallas office confirmed that the federal agency is investigating and more details will be available once the investigation is complete.

Lufkin ISD directed comments to Berry & Clay Construction, the construction manager for the multi-purpose facility and the middle school projects. Berry & Clay said the man worked for S&D Erectors and directed comment to them.

One of the co-owners of S&D Erectors said the company had no comment at this time on the incident.

 
 

Grace Juarez's email address is grace.juarez@lufkindailynews.com.

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  • 3 weeks later...

Wanted to make a comparison to facilities we have already seen in our football travels, back in 6A down in Conroe/The Woodlands. Conroe ISD, Woodforest Stadium in Shenandoah, Tx (The Woodlands) has a Natatorium attached to their stadium complex.  The total square footage of that structure is 64,000 square feet.  

The new Lufkin ISD,  Multi-Purpose Facility/Gymnasium/Offices/ Auxiliary Gym will be a total of 65,200 square feet as a comparison.  Please compare to above aerial photo of the Multi- Purpose construction.

49-Woodforest1[1].jpg

The Woodlands building has a more aerodynamic look, maybe because it's a natatorium.

 

 

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19 hours ago, PackAttack said:

More information on the work progressing @ New Lufkin ISD Gym

https://www.ktre.com/video/2020/08/31/work-progressing-new-lufkin-isd-gym/

Work progressing on New Lufkin ISD Gym

 

Looking more and more like architect's drawing.

 

 

FB_IMG_1599010077899.jpg

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  • 1 month later...

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