Neelyville R-IV school board received an update on the current building project with several board members expressing concerns over the quality of the work being done.
At last month’s meeting, the board approved a bid from Crafton Equipment for $184,000. Construction started Aug. 5, with a projected completion date of the beginning of November.
Superintendent Debra Parish said the district was able to negotiate with the lowest bidder, Crafton Equipment, to reduce the cost by $10,000. The school district will purchase the construction supplies and provide them to Crafton, as part of this agreement.
The project is to build a new high school office — which will include the high school principal’s office, the curriculum director, the technical career director, in school suspension and alternative school.
However, at Thursday night’s meeting, several board members said they had seen what they called “sloppy work” on the building, with most of the framework already done.
Several board members expressed concerns about the way the frame was put together, whether or not the boards would remain waterproof and if things were put together level. They agreed most of the concerns could be fixed later in the process, but were worried the corrections might not be made.
Parish said Friday she and some of the board members met with representatives from Crafton Equipment to discuss the concerns and the meeting went well. The representatives, she said, assured them the concerns would be fixed.
“The district is pleased with the speed of the work,” she said. “We are appreciative of the contractor listening and addressing the concerns in a timely manner.”
The board approved paying the $41,000 bill to Crafton’s at the meeting. This was the first bill on the project.
Levy Tax
Along with the regular meeting, the board also hosted a tax levy hearing to discuss the new rate.
The tax levy is based on property taxes, which went up by almost $380,000 between the current tax year and the previous tax year. Most of the change came from residential real estate, according to documents from the county clerk offices for Butler and Ripley counties.
The district used an electronic submission through the Missouri State Auditor’s office to see what that meant for the levy tax. This process said the district could set the tax rate at 2.9668%. Last year, the tax rate was 2.9657%, Parish said.
The revenue that’s projected to produce is $1,196,223, but Parish said that amount won’t all be collected because some people don’t file taxes and there are fees that come out.
During the hearing, the public was invited to come and provide comments. However, none came out.
Parish recommended the full amount to the board and it was approved.
Collecting Caps
The school district is collecting the plastic caps from bottles for two different projects with the hope to improve the campuses with them.
One project is for the caps to be recycled. Parish said plastic caps of any kind — from soda caps to detergent caps — can be turned in and get recycled. She said the goal through the project is to collect enough to recycle them into small picnic tables for the Hillview and Neelyville campuses as well as possibly some benches for the older students.
The other project is specifically for Pepsi caps, which Parish said the district is forming a committee to look at with two representatives from each school. This collection is only for pink “pigskin” caps, according to Pepsi MidAmerica, and they need to be turned into the high school by Dec. 14.
The project was brought to Parish by one of the board members with the idea that there’s a contest where schools compete with campuses of a similar size to see who can collect the most caps. Once collected, the caps are weighed and the three schools with the most in that category receive prize money, with the first place receiving $10,000.
“We are collecting every plastic cap,” Parish said.
Growing classes
High school principal Justin Dobbins said during his update at the meeting that the new seventh grade class is almost twice as large as the 2019 graduating class.
Last year’s graduating class was 32 people, he said, and the current count for seventh grade is 63 students.
“Seventh grade orientation was packed,” he said. “And I mean packed, which is good.”