Trees are felled. Brush grubbed. Dirt is on the move. In about a year, the St. Lucie Public Schools District will have a brand-new administration building that will once again house all its various departments and support staff.
The District closed on the purchase of a 10-acre site near Tutto Fresco Italian restaurant on Commerce Center Parkway in the area of Interstate 95 and PGA Village. A groundbreaking originally planned for June has since been pushed back and no date has been scheduled.
School officials are turning their focus to the upcoming school year and expect to hold all the pomp and circumstance of a ceremonial groundbreaking after school resumes in August. “Our focus and priority is ensuring a smooth kick-off for the new school year,” said Schools spokeswoman Kerry Padrick.
John Gillette, Director of Building Services and Projects, said they have received and approved the architectural renderings for the three-story, 107,000-square-foot building. “We are moving forward,” he said.
Drivers in the area will see the dirt being moved on the site as crews install underground utilities as part of the second phase of the three-step project. The next phase will come later, when the building begins to sprout out of the ground and go vertical.
The School District is using a combination of insurance proceeds and sales tax funds from the state to complete the nearly $18 million project.
Hurricane Irma flooded the Orange Blossom Mall, where the School District’s administrative offices had been housed, displacing 300 administrative personnel and forcing the district to split departments over five or six sites around the county. The administration office supports 41,000 students and 6,000 employees district-wide.
How much, exactly, the School District will get from its insurance policy remains to be determined. The district is working through the process and has, so far, recouped almost $1.3 million.
Cleaning up Orange Blossom and moving back in was “almost a non-starter,” said Deputy Superintendent Dr. Jon Prince, adding that the building is almost uninsurable at this point, having sustained three 100-year floods. “It is an investment,” Dr. Prince said of opting to build new. “An investment in the future.”
He called the new administration building the “face of the District” – the first impression many potential employees will get.
The District scouted properties it already owned but decided buying a raw piece of land near the emerging population center of Port St. Lucie would be the better solution. Located near Interstate 95 and the Florida Turnpike, as well St. Lucie West Boulevard, the property would be conveniently located for more employees district-wide.
Along with using proceeds from insurance and monies earmarked specifically for capital projects from the state, the district plans to sell its portion of Orange Blossom Mall. It currently has an appraised value of $4.1 million – with flooding issues mitigated, according to the District.
Once sold, those proceeds are expected to be used to offset the cost of construction of the new administration building.
Dr. Prince said that there will be no impact to already programmed construction and improvement projects within the District’s five-year capital improvement plan. All projects the District has had on the books to complete will proceed as planned.
Gillette said the District has benefited greatly from the cooperation it has received from numerous agencies while the various departments have been displaced.
Indian River State College, too, has stepped up, offering to house the District’s Student Services department.
With the new school year quickly approaching, though, the School District will be temporarily relocating the department to the Treasure Coast Public Safety Training Complex, 4600 Kirby Loop Rd., Fort Pierce, to better accommodate the amount of traffic the department anticipates. The department will be in the Frank & LeVan Fee Physical and High Liability Training Building, located off 35th Street near the IRSC main campus.
The site will be open Aug. 1-13 from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.
