Four districts granted state repair funding

Fixing up the boiler, buying brand-new bleachers, and even a new roof are now possible for four school districts in Whitman County who were awarded state grants for building repairs.

Oakesdale, Palouse, Colton, and St. John all applied for the state’s small repair grant program and were awarded funds from among 120 districts. The top 47 projects were picked as the most urgent.

A total of $3 million will go to the schools for construction projects, with a cap of $100,000 per district.

“This is just really, really good news for us,” said Palouse Supt. Bev Fox. “It was really a big project that we found out we were facing.”

After last winter’s freezing and thawing, cracks in the exterior bricks of a wing of the Palouse school widened. The roof above the entry will also be repaired with the $100,000.

St. John High School’s boiler which is over 50 years old has been making too much noise for a long time, and some parts are faulty. With the $60,000, they’d like to replace some of the parts in the boiler.

“A little too much noise- [we’re] hoping to relieve that. Student’s haven’t been cold at this point, so we hope to catch that ahead of time,” said Superintendent Rick Winters.

Winters said they aim to finish the project before the weather gets too cold this year.

The money must be spent by June 2011.

Colton plans to replace wooden bleachers with its $85,000 grant.

“We’re an old vintage building. This will make the bleachers safe, a big improvement,” said Supt. Dale Foley He added they will try to get the bleachers installed as soon as possible.

Fox said the biggest problem with the entry is where edging on the aging roof has allowed water to leak on the bricks below.

“After last winter, with the freezing and thawing we had, it really made the gaps- the cracking got bigger, longer, and wider,” said Fox.

Fox said they would like to repair the brickwork as soon as possible, maybe even by this fall.

She added that when the school discovered the problems in the masonry a few years ago, they had thought they may have to pay out of their general fund to fix the damage. And when the state budget starting slicing out of education, they became even less convinced they would receive state money for the repairs. But they applied for the program anyway.

Oakesdale was also awarded $100,000 to repair their school roof.