Architecture Firms Visit Geary Schools to Discuss Facilities

GEARY – Four architectural firms visited the Stegall Long Field House on Monday and Tuesday evening for a community discussion on school facilities and future improvements.

The discussions come as the Geary district weighs its next move to improve its aging buildings. Geary Public Schools’ current facilities often require costly maintenance to upkeep, but previous efforts at new construction have failed in a community vote.

On Monday night, Geary residents heard from Oklahoma City’s TAB Architecture and Edmond’s Kerr 3 Architects. Both firms have been involved with K-12 school construction in Oklahoma in the past.

John Moore was on hand to discuss TAB’s proposal, while four Kerr 3 representatives attended the meeting. Geary superintendent Sean Buchanan moderated the sessions, in which architects gave an overview of their ideas and fielded questions from the community.

Moore passed around a booklet containing information on TAB’s past projects, but advised the community that no two projects are alike. “And no project is in the same budget,” Moore said, “because they’re designed to meet the community’s needs.”

Both TAB and Kerr 3 estimated that new construction would cost about $289 per square foot, though TAB’s projection was based on a 40,000-square-foot facility and Kerr 3 proposed an 80,000-foot building. Buchanan reminded the audience that it’s premature to talk about specifics like the size of the building, which would be based on the district’s needs and feedback from school teachers, administrators and community members.

Kerr 3 representative James Kerr said small, rural districts are his company’s “sweet spot.”

“We do a lot of rural districts,” Kerr said, adding that a majority of Kerr 3’s projects are schools. “The thing for us is, this is a long-term commitment. It’s a relationship that the community, the board, the superintendent has with the architectural firm.

“We really enjoy working with districts the size of Geary,” Kerr said, “because we know that, if a bond passes, it’s going to have a tremendous impact not only on the district, but the community.”

Notably, Kerr 3 has worked with Calumet Public Schools for about a decade and built new elementary and high school facilities for them. Calumet and Geary have comparable enrollment figures.

Kerr 3 representatives also talked about working to generate knowledge and awareness about the bond issue, and why it’s needed, in the community. With the last two bonds having failed, the firm said good communication will be key to a successful bond election.

TAB’s Moore advised that renovating existing Geary facilities would be prohibitively expensive, but Kerr 3 discussed that possibility and said it would cost about $145 per square foot to renovate Geary’s existing 77,000-square-foot facilities.

Another two firms gave a presentation on Tuesday night; the Watonga Republican will recap those presentations next week.