School building boom under way

By Bill Donovan
Staff writer

GALLUP — That clamor of hammers and saws that has been heard throughout McKinley County during the past year does not signal a beginning of an economical revival.

Instead, it’s coming from the Gallup-McKinley County School District, which is seeing the biggest construction boom in its history.

Within an 18-month window, more than $100 million worth of projects have been approved and started, with the district creating new schools — such as a third middle school in Gallup — and replacement schools in Tohatchi and Crownpoint, just to name a few of the projects that are now under construction.

“I don’t think we would have seen this much money coming to Gallup from the state if it hadn’t been for the impact aid lawsuit,” said George Kozeliski, the attorney who represented the school district in that lawsuit.

Although the district came up one justice short throughout the legal process, which ended up in the U.S. Supreme Court, Kozeliski and others in the school district said the court case result in New Mexico loosening up its purse strings and funding new projects throughout the county.

Among the projects that have been funded:

• A renovation and addition to JFK Mid-School, now under way, will cost between $13 million and $15 million.
• A new middle school, which is being built behind Gallup High School, and a new Student Support Center, which will house the Central Office, will be completed in the next few months, costing more than $20 million for the middle school alone.
• A new elementary school at Tohatchi. Groundbreaking is Tuesday and when it is completed in June 2009 it is expected to cost about $12 million and replace the current elementary school which is 51 years old and has substantial structural problems.
• A new building that combines a middle school and a high school in Ramah, which is allowing the district to replace a lot of portable classrooms. This cost $18 million.
• A new Navajo, N.M., middle school, which will cost $12 million and will replace a portable village that has been used by the district as classrooms. This will be two stories tall, like the new school in Ramah.
• A new middle school in Crownpoint, which began construction some three months ago and is expected to cost more than $11 million when completed.

And school officials are hoping that it doesn’t end there.

Leonard Haskie, the district’s assistant superintendent who oversees renovation and construction projects in the district, said school officials are going to the state with almost $90 million of new construction projects for the immediate future.

This includes:

• $38 million to convert the former Gallup Junior High into Miyamura High School.
• $25 million to $30 million for a new middle school in Thoreau.
• $8 million to $10 million for a new elementary school in Churchrock.