Athens City School District was forced to demolish its old Plains Elementary school building last week due to its deteriorating, irreparable condition.
Athens Superintendent Carl Martin said the building, at 25 state Route 682, needed to be demolished for safety reasons, including no working heat or electricity and bricks falling from the top of the walls and roof of the building.
Our architect looked at the building and said it would never be able to be used for school purposes
Martin said. The building needed to be torn down because it wasn't habitable. It could only be used for storage.
The building hasn't been used for classes for the past 16 years. A baseball field near the school that Plains Elementary students used for recreation was also a major concern. A makeshift fence was put up around the perimeter of the building to protect people walking by from falling bricks, but Martin said it became very clear that the district needed to take the building out of commission.
The Athens school board accepted a bid from Badger Construction of Morgantown, W.Va., during an organizational meeting Jan. 5 to demolish The Plains building and to remove a boiler from the administrative building for $42,800.
Demolition started as early as last Monday, and the building was completely down earlier this week, said Dave McAllister, Athens City Board of Education business manager.
The building dates back to the early 1900s and was used as part of The Plains Elementary School until about 1990, Martin said. When the current elementary school at 90 Connett Rd. in The Plains was built, the old building was turned into a storage warehouse.
Athens City School District is looking into putting a new maintenance storage facility at the site of the demolished elementary school building. The district hopes to have the maintenance storage facility up within the next year McAllister said.
There are two other buildings in The Plains complex that will not be destroyed. One building was renovated into an administrative offices building. The second building has a gym and an area used for storage. Martin said that in the next few months, that storage area will be renovated and turned into a district technology center.
We need to relocate our servers and technology equipment to a better facility Martin said.
McAllister said the technology center should not be a large project because the school's personnel will be able to do the painting and small adjustments needed in order to renovate it.
We're trying to use the space we have to its full potential
McAllister said.
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