Even before the CRC Charter School first opened its doors we knew that we would eventually need to have our own building. Paying rent and being at the mercy of a landlord who might want to rent his building to someone else or just raise the rent beyond what our funding could support was not a good long term option. We looked, but could find no building in Putnam County suitable.
So we started to dream about a builiding designed to support our unique school synergy between teacher growth and reading instruction. The above picture gives an idea of the dream we developed for a facility of our own.
We chose "monolithic dome" construction for its high energy efficiency, great fire and natural disaster safety and low maintenance costs. The circular floor plan seemed to fit perfectly with our desire to have the library in the center of the teaching space. In spite of the rapid increases in concrete and steel costs that occurred during the design effort, we still expected that construction costs per square foot would be less than typical for usual public schools built in Florida.
The problem of rapidly increasing construction costs was acute because of our non-expanding financial resources and bureaucratic slowness that exacerbated the disparity between costs and resources by adding to any time delay. Because we had USDA Rural Development funding, the way we awarded our contract and the requirements of the builder were rigidly prescribed. The prescription was an expensive one, especially in an uncertain building market, but the benefit of having our own facility with USDA loan terms made the effort all worthwhile.
In February 2006 we completed a second revision of the plans with value engineering to try to bring the cost within our budget. At the end of March we received a winning, qualified and within budget bid from GMC construction out of Gainesville. The USDA completed its "due diligence" study of the bid and winning bidder, the contract was signed, and we obtained the notice to proceed.
Receiving the notice to proceed.
The CRC purchased over 11 acres of land on the most western part of St Johns Avenue. About 3.5 acres are immediately available for construction. The remainder is designated wetlands by the St. Johns Water Management District. City sewer and water are provided with anticipated annexation by the City of Palatka.
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Finally, after what seemed like interminable delays, we got our new facility and were able to move into it. So now the descripton of our school building can be placed on the FACILITY NOW page of this web site --- though perhaps it should be titled NOW and FOREVERMORE.