Bid for new skills center awarded in November

MOSES LAKE - The new skills center, which now has a new name, will go out to bid sometime in October.

Dave Balcom, executive director for secondary education, reported to the Moses Lake School Board that the skills center's directors decided to change the name to Columbia Basin Skills Center. Balcom said the name reflects that a school in Adams County (Othello) is part of the consortium.

Everything in the building's interior, like paint colors and floors, has been selected, Balcom said; with Moses Lake as the lead agency, the district still has paperwork that must be submitted before the project can go out to bid, said Mark Johnson, executive director of business and operations.

In other business at the regular board meeting Thursday, Johnson reported the first enrollment count of the school year was about the equivalent of 7,550 students. That's about 200 students above the budget projection, which estimated enrollment would remain about the same. The kindergarten class is the biggest in about a decade, Johnson said, and a teacher was moved from North Elementary to Knolls Vista Elementary School to accommodate the extra kindergarten students there.

Balcom announced the district has graduated a fourth person from its online program, and that students will have additional options online this school year.