The high school project has been advertised to bidders for a couple of weeks now. At last check, three companies had requested plans. Subcontractors are working on their bids and will be submitting to the General Contractors who have pulled plans. We've advertised in the Seattle Daily Journal of Commerce as well as in the Lewis County News, The Daily News and the Chronicle. I'm hearing from folks in our community that they're planning to submit subcontractor bids. Wishing everyone good fortune as we move forward.
We'll have a meeting for interested General Contractors on Dec. 10 so that they can get an on-site view of the project and ask questions of the architects and engineers. Bidding will close on January 14 with bid opening at 3:15 p.m. at the Toledo District Office.
We're tentatively planning on a ceremonial groundbreaking on January 31 at 4 p.m. The project is scheduled to officially begin on February 3.
We've arranged with ToledoTel to install a video camera on the stadium that will stream live video of the project. We plan to include this view on the kiosks we've installed at the schools and at the Community Library and Post Office. We'll also have a view available on our website. This will give community members the opportunity to watch construction in real time 24/7.
Our architects from IBI Group will be on hand on Monday Dec. 16 to give students at THS a virtual reality "walk through" of the new school. Using VR technology, students will be able to "look around" the new school. Should be an exciting morning.
By clicking this link, you'll see IBI's presentation to the Building Committee last month. It includes floor plans and phasing as well as some interior renderings. Those pages have a QR code in the upper right corner. Use your smartphone's camera to capture a code. It should take you to a Virtual Reality version of that area of the high school. By moving your phone around, you can see what the school is planned to look like inside.
Everyone is getting very excited for the start of construction. A lot of work has gone into the design and engineering of the building. We've done quite a bit of work to minimize change orders and to try to predict where there will be uncertainties. We're looking forward to seeing the plans begin to take shape.
