Members of the Bethlehem Area School Board heard about upcoming capital improvement projects at the Facilities Committee meeting Oct. 5.

Mark Stein, the chief facilities and operations officer, told the board that the SPARK roof replacement needs to be the summer project for 2016.

“Five years ago, the SPARK project was deferred,” Stein said, but it shouldn’t be put off any longer.

The estimated cost to replace the roof is $334,000. Currently, the school district is finishing this past summer’s project – the wireless project. The estimated cost for going wireless in all of the school district’s buildings is $392,823, he said. The wireless project had totaled more than $2 million, but had been subsidized through an E-rate grant, Superintendent Joseph Roy said.

Stein also would like to begin the first phase of stadium upgrades next summer. The first phase would include turf and track replacement at a cost of $778, 680. He said the life span of the turf and track is about eight to 10 years. The track is going on its 14th season, and the turf is in its 12th season.

The following summer in 2017, the second phase of the stadium project would be painting the stands. Stein estimates the cost of painting to be about $865,200.

“There is some rust showing through,” Stein said. “We want to get a handle on that before it becomes a structural problem.”

“When the stands are full, you don’t see the rust,” Roy joked.

The total cost of the three summer projects is about $2.4 million. The cost would be offset through one-time revenue sources, Stein said. These include the sale of the Monocacy building for $367,350; the sale of the Rosemont building for $790,500; the lease extension of the SPARK building for $596,250; cell tower lease capitalization for $300,000 and the Nitschmann MS solar panel credit for $240,000. The total revenue would be about $2.3 million.

School board member Sudantha Vidanage asked if doing away with the solar panel project was the right decision.

Michael Faccinetto, the president of the school board, explained to him that there isn’t roof space up there to place the number of solar panels needed to make a sufficient amount of electricity. The electricity generated by the solar panels would be only 3 percent of the total electricity used by the school, he said. The savings on electricity just doesn’t outweigh the cost of the panels.

Roy congratulated Stein and his co-workers for being “conscious of taxpayers’ dollars in our budget, so we don’t have to dip into our capital reserve for these projects.” Roy was pleased that they were able to closely match the cost of needed projects with one-time revenue sources.

One project that Stein would also like to pursue is the ventilator replacement at East Hills MS. This project would be slated for the summer of 2017, and would cost a little more than $1 million. Stein said the project “needs to get on the radar,” but a funding source, outside of the capital reserve fund, has not been determined.

Vidanage asked why the needed project was going to be postponed until 2017.

Stein said there isn’t enough time to get the project designed and ready for next summer. Arif Fazil, a principal at D’Huy Engineering Inc. in Bethlehem, added that it’s also putting the project out to bid, choosing a company to handle the project and then the acquisition of materials. It takes at least 16 weeks just to get all of the materials delivered and in place before the project start date.

One project that is well underway is the construction of the new Nitschmann. In a job progress update, D’Huy Engineering reported that excavation of the building pad is complete and 85 percent of the foundations for the kitchen and boiler room have been installed. The installation of concrete footings and retaining walls is ongoing, as is the installation of underground plumbing and electrical lines.