What will it cost to remove asbestos ahead of renovations at Lehighton Area Middle School?

The school district's board of directors aims to find out following a unanimous 8-0 motion Monday night to authorize JMSI Environmental Corp. to complete an asbestos abatement study and prepare bid specification documents for the project.Board member Wayne Wentz was absent from the workshop meeting.According to Lehighton Superintendent Jonathan Cleaver, he had planned to bring the agreement before the board later this month, but several board members said the process should be expedited."I think we should do this as soon as possible and push for the asbestos removal to be done at night and completed by the end of January," board member William Hill Jr. said.The district has been looking at a $10.7 million renovation to the middle school, which could include an energy savings component through Trane Comprehensive Solutions."Trane isn't going to touch this until we take care of the asbestos," Hill added.Hill later made a motion, unanimously approved, for an agreement with Trane to be put on the district's Sept. 29 agenda.Resident David Bradley questioned the rush for abatement."Almost every other school does asbestos removal in the summer when there is no risk to students," Bradley said. "This should have been done several years ago in the summer to protect the children."Hill said with the "safety measures out there now, there is zero risk to children.""The entire board would never put any student, employee or the public at risk," added board member Rocky Ahner. "With the asbestos specifications, we will have a better understanding of the entire scope of work that has to be done for the middle school renovation project."Board member Hal Resh went through an asbestos removal project while he taught at Carbon Career and Technical Institute."The contractor came in after the students left for the day and encapsulated what they needed to," Resh said."They worked through the night, and by the time the staff came in the next day, you would have never even known they were there."Cleaver said a preliminary estimate of the asbestos removal cost would be around $100,000. With the work being done at night and possibly over holiday breaks for students, the cost will be higher than if it were done during the day, he said.Lehighton's middle school design committee, which includes the full school board, met last week and Cleaver reported on some of the discussion Monday."One of the things we are looking at is moving the cafeteria and media center to the first floor of the building," Cleaver said. "Our sixth-grade classes would be on the first floor and our seventh- and eighth-graders would be on the second floor. This is all part of a teaming design concept that keeps the individual grade levels in different sections."Currently, the middle school also houses fifth-grade students but that would change under the district's proposed elementary center construction. All K-5 students would be located in the new building, although its opening, according to Cleaver, is three years out in a best-case scenario.Modular classrooms currently located at the middle school would likely be removed as part of the renovation project, Cleaver said.Moving the cafeteria to the first floor would leave a vacant ground floor, and that notion doesn't sit well with Hill."I don't like the thought of wasted space in a public building," he said,Cleaver said the space could have a variety of uses including an auxiliary gymnasium and technical education classes.Like it did with its proposed new elementary center and renovations to the high school, Lehighton submitted paperwork necessary for any state reimbursement on the middle school project. The district has also applied for an energy savings grant and a federal interest-free bond, but has yet to hear the results of those efforts.The district meets today at 5 p.m. for a finance committee meeting followed by a 6:30 p.m. public interaction session dubbed "Construction 101" presented by Quandel Construction. Both meetings are open to the public and held at the district administration building.