HURON — The Huron School Board swore in two members and welcomed a new superintendent at the beginning of its July 12 meeting, which ended with the approval of a change order for the school district’s CTE (Career and Technical Education) building project.
Monday’s meeting was the first of the fiscal year for the board, and the first order of business was the swearing in of board members Kristi Glanzer and Tim Van Berkum for three-year terms on the board.
Following the swearing in process, Garret Bischoff was elected by the board as its chairperson for the upcoming year, with Shelly Siemonsma elected to the vice-chair position. Following the board elections, Bischoff took the reins of the meeting from Business Manager Kelly Christopherson.
A change order in the amount of $131,014 for the school’s CTE project was put forward by Kyburz-Carlson Construction, largely to correct an oversight, pertaining to wages.
According to Christopherson, as the CTE project is expected to be paid for with federal stimulus funds, the Davis-Bacon Wage Act requires contractors and subcontractors working on federally funded jobs to pay their laborers wages and benefits no less than what others locally pay their workers for similar projects.
The change order will increase the cost of the project to $2.29 million and will alter the change date, predominantly due to the delay to get the steel building, to April next spring. A smaller portion of the change order involves a change in material for use on the roof of the building. A product called IsoGard will be used in place of wooden fiber board.
Between the swearing in ceremony and the change order, the school board addressed numerous ‘first meeting’ issues, including setting several policies for the district, accepting conflict disclosure statements from a handful of administrators and board members and setting other designations.
Christopherson noted that the manufacturer of the school’s new chiller unit for Huron Middle School has pushed back the ship date until Aug. 30, due to a delay in production of the processing chips needed to operate the system. “The preliminary work will be done ahead of time, so when it does arrive, it should go quickly,” Christopherson said. Installation is tentatively scheduled for October.
In his first Superintendent’s Report, Dr. Kraig Steinhoff thanked the community for the welcome that he and his family has received since arriving in town.
Steinhoff also shared that in preparation for an expected $6.2 million in the third round of federal stimulus funding, the school district has established a survey on its website to gather input from the community. He said he also anticipates hosting a community meeting as well. The school’s website is www.huron.k12.sd.us. On the homepage, look for the ARPO/ESSER link to take the survey.
Christopherson was designated as the district’s business manager, school board meetings are set to continue the 2nd and 4th Mondays of most months, salaries for board members was set to $70 per meeting ($75 for the board chair and vice-chair) and the Huron Plainsman was designated as the official newspaper for legal publications.
Bids for a 10-year beverage contract were opened prior to the meeting and the board approved Christopherson’s recommendation to choose Coca-Cola as the exclusive beverage supplier. The contract stipulates the cost of bottled soda pop, water, sports drinks, bottled juice and tea for the coming school year and calls for a 3% increase in each successive year, as well as an annual $4,000 contribution to the school district.
In a somewhat related agenda item, the board approved concessions pricing for the coming year, including several items that will increase in price. Christopherson noted that School Nutrition Manager Amanda Reilly, who oversees concessions, did a thorough examination and found that in some cases prices had remained the same on some items for up to 10 years.
The board set July 26 as the date for the online surplus property auction with Ben Meyer Auctions, and also approved $3,145 in surplus band instruments to be traded in on new replacements.
