Oregon Schools

School Levy Projects Start
After Record Breaking Bond Issues Passed

Portland - Nine months ago Portland area voters in 14 school districts passed school bond issues worth close to $1 billion.

The largest levy was for $229.6 million in the North Clackamas School District.  Regardless of the district, almost all of the funds will be spent to replace and repair schools, most of which are close to 40 years old.

The Medford school district in Southern Oregon also has a hefty school construction bond measure, for $188 million.

The new Happy Valley Elementary will serve 550 students in grades Kindergarten through sixth. A new middle school on the same site and under the same roof will serve 750 students in grades 7 and 8. The new schools will help relieve crowding at Happy Valley Elementary and Sunrise Middle Schools, keeping pace with rapid growth in the area.

Happy Valley Elementary/Middle School is the flagship of the North Clackamas School District's 2006 bond campaign.  This $39.5M school is 186,000 sq ft on three levels, according to Dale Kuykendall of Emerick Construction, Portland. The elementary school and the middle school share a building envelope, but generally operate independently. 

The site is difficult to build on, with a very soft layer of earth underlying the project.  About 600 driven grout piles are being installed to carry the building loads.  To accommodate the schedule the school district is using CM/GC, allowing Emerick as the construction manager to bid out the project in packages.  The elementary portion is scheduled to open September 09, with the middle school portion later that fall. Completion of the elementary school will occur in August of 2008, with the middle school completion in January 2009. The 1892 bell at Happy Valley Elementary has been a part of the school since it was built in 1917. It will be moved to the new school when the old school closes.

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Emerick is also the construction manager for  the Milwaukie High School project, which includes additions to the auditorium and extensive remodels of the existing locker room. At Rowe Middle School, Emerick will be expanding the gymnasium space and also doing significant remodels.  The District chose to bundle these two projects into a single $11 million package, as they are very close to each other geographically, and also will likely share construction team members.

The first large project under way is the Sherwood High School under construction for the Sherwood School District. The addition and expansion of Sherwood High School will enlarge the student enrollment capacity of the existing school from 1,000 to 1,600.  In order to increase the school’s capacity, it is important to not only add teaching spaces but to increase the core use areas such as the student commons to be able to accommodate the increased enrollment.

The new designs include 79,300 sq ft of new construction, and remodels to approximately 34,300 sq ft of current space, with demolition (to make room for additions) of approximately 9,000 sq ft.  The main elements of the additions are general classrooms, science classrooms, a kitchen, a woods classroom, the school district technology services center, arts & culinary areas, PE/Athletics team rooms, a weight room, greenhouse, central storage and music rooms.  The main elements included in the remodel are the student commons, boys’ locker room, and the music room.

Major site renovations have been designed to help with current site circulation problems and to provide additional parking for the increase in student enrollment.  These renovations include the realignment of the main vehicular accesses to the site with the streets directly across Meinecke Road.  A traffic signal will be installed to improve the service level of the main entrance. Skanska USA Building is the general contractor, Dull Olson Weekes Architects, the project architect, and KJM Associates the owner's representative.