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Buildings & Grounds Supervisor Glenn Fenner was on hand Monday to tell the Lansing Board of Education about progress on capital projects that are in progress.  Much of the work is done on the Energy Performance Contract, and it has already yielded significant savings in energy costs.  The next stage will be the drilling of 40 geothermal wells on the west side of Lansing High School, to be used for heating and cooling the building.

"It makes a considerable amount of noise," said Superintendent Stephen Grimm.  "We don't want to have it happen during the day until after graduation."


Fenner said that if drilling does begin before school ends it will only be during a 'second shift,' after 3pm.  He said workers can use lights to drill after dark.  Traffic between the middle school and high school will be changed while construction is going on.  Fenner said a back door will remain usable near the student parking lot.

"They claim it will take four to six weeks to drill 40 wells," Fenner said.  "They can only fit one well driller machine at a time, because it's not that big a lot."

Grimm says that there are funds for 'mini-projects' each year.  Last year Fenner's team relocated the School District Office to a wing of the elementary school.  This year Grimm hopes to move the principal's office to the front of the high school.

"Right now we're waiting for more bids to come in," Fenner said.  "Right now they're coming in a little high.  We can do some of the work ourselves, and that will help.  The school definitely needs it.  It's been a long time coming."


The plan calls for two offices on the west side of the main entrance.  Three tiers of room 101 would be raised and separated to form a new principal's office and a security office.  The move would free the current principal's office for use by the school psychologist, allowing for privacy and consolidating all student counselling into one space.

Fenner says the principal's office will be at the front of the building with a window that allows Principal Eric Hartz to see the front of the building, including the bus circle.  A second office would be behind that.  When school opens in the morning the front doors will be unlocked as they always have been.  After that only the left-hand door will be open, forcing people to go through the second office to sign in before entering the school.

"One of the things this does for us is give us a much safer entrance," Hartz said.  "Anybody entering would have to go through the second office to the left.  That would be a secretary's office with a guest book to be signed.  Right now anybody can walk in, especially to the Athletic Director's office.   They don't come to the main office to sign in, so we don't have a record of who comes in and out."

If the bids are within the budget, Grimm hopes to have the work done this year.  Once done the front entrance will be the only entrance to the school.

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