Architect presents report on school buildings

I first started at the Bemidji (Minn.) Pioneer as an intern in the summer of 1996. That would begin six years as a news reporter, sports reporter and copy editor for a small, six-day-per-week daily newspaper in northern Minnesota. I wrote a large range of stories from multiple beats, to features to sports, my favorite being the coverage of the Red Lake Reservation High School basketball team named the Warriors. Here is a collection of my stories from my time at the Pioneer.

March 19, 1997

By Devlyn Brooks

Staff Writer

Voters could know by as early as June what decisions the Bemidji School Board will recommend for the aging Bemidji High School and Lincoln Elementary School, representatives of DLR Group said at Monday's board meeting.

DLR Group, a Minneapolis architectural firm hired in January by the district's Facility Committee to study how to remedy problems with the schools, presented a preliminary report and also answered questions posed from board and audience members.

Griff Davenport of DLR said the company has been interviewing several groups of people over the last few weeks, gleaning information to be used in a final recommendation that is scheduled to be in board members' hands in June.

On DLR's time line, February and March were used to gather information from every possible party who would be affected by the school decision, he said.

April is slated as a month in which the company will "explore solutions, and test scenarios and cost models." DLR will refine its solutions and cost models and host community focus groups to present the information in May and finally in June, it will finalize the process, reach a consensus and make a recommendation to the board.

Davenport said he and his associates have been meeting with groups of people which include the staffs of both schools, business community members, parents, the Bemidji Area Chamber of Commerce, Beltrami County officials and even students.

"We've met with them all to get to know the community," he said. "Successful projects come from knowing the community."

In their "preliminary observations," DLR representative Chris Gibbs said there are three types of issues to be concerned with when discussing the situations at both buildings: program, health and safety and miscellaneous issues.

Gibbs said under the programs issues, existing spaced per student and space efficiency questions have been raised at Lincoln.

Currently there is 123 square feet of building space for every student at Lincoln, Gibbs said, but the national average for elementary students is 140 to 180 square feet per student. And the existing space efficiency for Lincoln is 73 percent, which is much higher than the national average of 60 percent.

Gibbs said the number of square building fee per student measures the number of square feet in a building divided by the number of kids attending the building -- no matter how much of the building is in walls, hallways or stairs. Measuring the space efficiency tells how much of the building's square feet is being used actually for teaching space.

"What this tells us is that (the Lincoln staff) is being generally efficient with their space for students," Gibbs said. "The staff is using every nook and cranny they can to house the kids and programs they're housing."

Some of Lincoln's health and safety issues involve ventilation and air flow, plumbing, accessibility and electrical problems.

The miscellaneous issues included room configurations, site, location, parking and traffic issues.

Davenport said the study of the High School has been an "equally challenging" effort as Lincoln.

"While you have a lot of strong programs," he said of the High School, "your building isn't very supportive of your programs."

Program issues at the High School also involve the space per student and space efficiency issues. At the High School, space efficiency is especially a focus because it is rated 53 percent. That means only about 170,000 square feet of the building's 319,000 square feet are being used directly in the teaching process. the national average for a high school is 66 to 70 percent, Davenport said.

Health and safety concerns at the High School include ventilation, plumbing, accessibility and electrical problems.

Davenport listed a number of miscellaneous issues, such as access to technology concerns to the operation of two entire separate buildings.

DLR representatives were scheduled to meet with the Facility Committee Tuesday and will present a report comparing current facilities with remodeled or entirely new facilities the next time they update the board.