Ringgold to hold public hearing on new middle school
A rendering of the new Ringgold Middle School
A rendering shows where the new Ringgold Middle School will be situated on the high school campus in Carroll Township.
NEW EAGLE – Ringgold School District is prepared to show its taxpayers the concept for a new $44 million middle school on the high school campus in Carroll Township.
Ringgold directors earlier this month scheduled a public hearing on their wish list for the new school before paring down its cost to nearly $38 million, board Vice President Christopher Carroll said.
“We’re taking our highest price to the public,” Carroll said following a school board meeting Wednesday at the district’s administration building in New Eagle.
The two-story building will have a brick exterior and separate wings for each grade level. It’s designed for grades 5 through 8, and it will be situated just west of the high school off Route 136.
“We are not building a Taj Mahal, but a good solid building that’s expected to last,” Carroll said. “I think we’re on the right track.”
Directors have included in the building’s design a 1,000-seat auditorium and a basement under the two wings that can be used for future classroom expansion.
Ringgold has struggled with the decision to build a new school since it consolidated elementary schools and closed old, aging schools in Donora and Monongahela in 2011. Many taxpayers supported reopening those schools as middle schools to replace Ringgold Middle School in Finleyville. Directors also debated whether to spend any more money to repair the Finleyville school, which shifts because it was built nearly 50 years ago on pyritic soil and on property that has been prone to developing sinkholes.
The new building has been accepted to receive state subsidies for its construction, Carroll said.
The district hopes to begin construction on the building in October and have it open for classes in August 2017.
The public hearing will be held at 6 p.m. April 8 in the administration building at 400 Main St., New Eagle.