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Borough seeks fresh perspective in new RFP for Soldotna schools

The sun shines on Soldotna Prep School on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024 in Soldotna, Alaska.
Ashlyn O'Hara
/
KDLL
The sun shines on Soldotna Prep School on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024 in Soldotna, Alaska.

The Kenai Peninsula Borough is forging ahead with plans for the future of Soldotna Elementary and Prep schools. The plans come on the heels of a brainstorming session with school board members.

When school board members met with borough officials last month, some were quick to express their frustration at the status of $65.5 million worth of deferred maintenance projects at peninsula schools. Specifically, the largest project in that package – the reconstruction of Soldotna Elementary School – has caused some heartburn.

Penny Vadla, who represents Soldotna on the school board, was one member who spoke.

“Quite frankly, I'm really displeased, and I'll explain why,” she said. “We have talked about repairing Soldotna Elementary for years. We have talked about having a safe, adequate atmosphere in school for our kids in Soldotna.”

Almost two years to the day after borough voters overwhelmingly backed the bond, some of the biggest-ticket projects remain in limbo.

Among other things, the bond was meant to pay for the reconstruction of Soldotna Elementary and the reconfiguration of the vacant Soldotna Prep School to alleviate crowding in other district buildings.

After the bond passed, though, project costs skyrocketed. The borough now estimates it’s between $12 and $15 million short of what it needs to build the projects described by the bond.

Speaking to KDLL last week, Borough Mayor Peter Micciche stressed the impact of inflation on bond work. He wasn’t yet mayor when the bond passed, and says he’s doing the best he can with a situation he inherited.

“This thing was inadequately funded, especially in a 8% inflation year, followed by, you know, another high year,” he said. “So — and just the logistical issues that have made project costs higher, we simply don't have enough money, so we're having to prioritize and work with the district on a solution forward.”

Last year, the borough spent more than $120,000 on an educational specification, or ed spec, for the Soldotna Elementary and Prep school projects. That’s a document required by the state education department ahead of new school construction. As previously reported by the Peninsula Clarion, the document, completed in January, details several options for reconfiguring the elementary and prep schools. District staff say one of those comes in at budget.

Now, the borough wants a second opinion. Last week, it issued a request for proposals seeking a new ed spec for the Soldotna projects. Here’s Micciche again.

“The RFP is going to be looking at how we can make Soldotna Prep the most efficient with Soldotna-area schools,” he said.

The new request builds on the previous one. For example, they’re asking the contractor to study relocation of Soldotna sixth graders to Skyview Middle School. That school currently only serves seventh and eighth graders. It also folds Redoubt Elementary School into the mix of programs being shuffled as part of the Soldotna Elementary rebuild and Soldotna Prep reconfiguration.

The borough will use a grant from the Department of Commerce, Community and Economic Development to pay for the new ed spec.

On Friday, Micciche said proposals aren’t due until later this month. If the district wants to make changes, he says the borough can incorporate their feedback as an addendum. He says the district was aware of the direction taken in the RFP and that communication went back and forth “for months.”

Micciche said the work is time-sensitive and necessitates a “parallel process.”

“We have a great superintendent and we will be actively driving our teams toward working together, solving this huge funding problem, arriving at a solution that’s best for our KPBSD kids and moving forward,” he said.

The new RFP says proposals will be kept confidential until a contract is awarded. It forbids any news about the award from being released without prior written approval by the borough’s purchasing and contracting director. And it says the mayor can reject proposals if he determines doing so is “in the best interest of the borough.”

The final ed spec is subject to approval by school board members.

At the end of last month’s work session, board members appeared in agreement they would further hone the RFP in a closed-door meeting at a future date.

“This sounds to me like it would be an executive session kind of discussion, to discuss different scenarios in the RFP,” said board member Jason Tauriainen. “I look forward to that.”

At the same meeting, Superintendent Clayton Holland said he wasn’t comfortable moving forward with an RFP unless he and board members knew what projects it included.

“So one of the pieces I think the school board needs to know before I sign off on anything is to clearly understand what the projects would be in the new RFP,” he said. “So what would we be looking at that's different than currently? So there's a little bit alluded to. And if that's something that can't be done in public – I don't know that — then maybe it needs to be an executive session.”

The borough has declined to make the original ed spec public and denied a public records request for a copy. During a pre-proposal meeting for the new RFP on Monday, borough staff also said they won’t give a copy to prospective bidders.

John Hedges is the borough’s purchasing and contracting director. During the school board work session, he said the borough didn’t want to publicly discuss specific parts of the RFP.

“The reason why we can't just present that RFP for your guys' review is, at that point it would become public record,” he said. “That RFP is going to be involved in a procurement process that, if it was placed on public record ahead of time, there might be an unfair circumstance associated with the individuals that would give us proposals on that.”

The school board’s next meeting is Monday. An executive session with borough officials to talk about the RFP is on the agenda.

The sun shines on Redoubt Elementary School on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024 in Soldotna, Alaska.
Ashlyn O'Hara
/
KDLL
The sun shines on Redoubt Elementary School on Tuesday, Oct. 1, 2024 in Soldotna, Alaska.

Prior to joining KDLL's news team in May 2024, O'Hara spent nearly four years reporting for the Peninsula Clarion in Kenai. Before that, she was a freelance reporter for The New York Times, a statehouse reporter for the Columbia Missourian and a graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism. You can reach her at aohara@kdll.org