Dateline: August 3, 2006

CISD completing $90k remodel of classrooms

By Roger Estlack, Clarendon Enterprise

While students are enjoying the remaining days of summer vacation, Clarendon ISD is wrapping up improvement projects that have spruced up the interior of junior high and elementary classrooms.

All the woodwork in the 1961-era buildings on campus has been stripped and refinished after 45 years of wear and tear. Countertops have been replaced throughout those buildings, and large cabinets in the elementary D-Wing have been put on wheels for more mobility.

Lockers in the A- and C-Wings have been repaired, repainted, and, in some places re-bolted to the walls. Ten or so handles still need to be replaced where the chrome has worn off, but Superintendent Monty Hysinger says the lockers will serve students for a long time to come.

“They just don’t make lockers like these any more; these are the best,” he said.

The biggest difference can be seen in the D-Wing where cabinets have new raised panel doors, new countertops, and new stainless steel sinks.

Contractor Jim Shadle says the list of improvements include refinishing 200 walk-through doors, 60 cabinet units, 68 closet doors, 23 trophy cases, 28 cabinet drawers, and 45 chalk and bulletin board frames. In addition, his crews have installed 153 new cabinet doors and 671 square feet of counter tops.

The cost to the district comes to a total of $90,000, Hysinger said, with more work still to come.

Sixty to 70 percent of the school’s roofs will be replaced – those on the B-, C-, and D-Wings – at a total cost to CISD’s insurance carrier of about $700,000.

This summer’s renovations come on the heals of a $500,000 abatement and renovation project last year during which all the floors and ceilings in the 1961-era buildings were replaced, all lights were replaced or retrofitted with new high-efficiency fixtures, all classrooms were repainted, and all the old green chalkboards will be replaced with new marker boards. The remnants of the school’s old boiler system were also removed last year.

“If we get the exterior doors replaced and the bathrooms remodeled next year, we will have completed an almost entire renovation of these buildings,” Hysinger said.