Moses Lake School Board OKs high school construction contract

MOSES LAKE — In a brief, emergency meeting Friday morning, the Moses Lake School Board approved the $58 million contract to build the district’s next high school.

“So we will move forward with this,” said School Board President Vickey Melcher. “This is exciting.”

Board members voted 4-1 to approve the contract. Bryce McPartland's voted against it.

The Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction signed off on the project on Wednesday and agreed to pay for roughly $20 million of the construction costs of the Real World Academy, as the school is informally called.

That means that roughly $38 million in construction costs are the responsibility of MLSD. While the construction itself is expected to come in at around $52 million, the “soft costs” of managing and overseeing the project are estimated to at nearly $6 million.

Puyallup-based Absher Construction submitted the low bid. According to the construction is expected to start in May, with the school set to receive its first class of students in the fall of 2022.

The school, with a capacity of 700-900 students, will be located on district-owned land between Moses Lake High School and the Columbia Basin Technical Skills Center.

The district is also currently building an $18.1 million elementary school, Groff Elementary, named after longtime school board member Vicki Groff. The school is going up south of Nelson Road, south of Moses Lake Christian Academy, and is expected to be completed this fall.

The two schools are the result of a revised construction plan originally passed by district voters in February 2017. At the time, voters just barely approved a $135 million bond to build a 1,600-student high school as well as a new elementary school.

However, a lengthy court challenge and a very contentious rethinking of the construction plan prompted the MLSD school board to opt to build a much smaller high school and two new elementary schools.