High school renovation underway

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Heavy equipment. Piles of dirt. What’s going on at Maricopa High School? The project, involving the equipment and massive digging, is the initial stage of the renovation and expansion of the high school campus.

According to Administrator of Business Services Mark Busch, the goal for this summer is to move away from septic and to Global sewer, with completion scheduled before students start back in August.

The project involves installing a line to the northwest edge of the property in order to connect to the existing, offsite sewer. The new line will need to be attached to existing buildings and stubbed for future buildings. In addition to the sewer, the contractor, McCarthy Construction, will realign power as necessary. This is Phase One of the overall project.

“All of this needs to be accomplished before any new building construction begins,” explained Busch. “Once completed, construction of new classroom space will begin and will continue throughout the year.” He added that there will be a detailed plan in place to separate construction personnel from students when the new school year begins.

The second phase of the renovation will involve administrative offices and classrooms.

Buildings scheduled for retention are the present cafeteria, library, multi-purpose room, gym, IT building, the elementary cafeteria used by Santa Cruz Elementary students last year and the classrooms directly west of the old middle school site.

Plans include relocating the baseball field, building storage and lockers at the football field, paving the parking lot adjacent to the football field and remodeling the library.

While the first phase of the renovation, the sewer project, is underway this summer, the overall high school expansion plan has a completion goal of 2009.