The aging infrastructure of the Garwin school complex’s 1925 building was the subject of much of the evening’s 20-minute presentation given by school board president Jill Roberts and Superintendent Chris Petersen. As T-R readers know, the neighboring Marshalltown Community School District (MCSD) is facing a similar situation with Miller Middle School — also constructed in 1925 — and a $57 million bond issue as part of a larger renovation, expansion and rebuilding project estimated to cost over $100 million will be on the ballot in November.

In front of an audience of close to 50 people in the upper gym, Roberts, who is in her fifth year on the board and has served as its president since November, introduced both herself and her fellow school board members. Previously, she taught math in the district for 25 years, and her children are GMG graduates.

Roberts then proceeded to list off her members’ credentials in an effort, she said, to showcase the board’s “connection” and “commitment” to the district. Those credentials include:

• Doug Dieleman — 1995 GMG graduate, 14 years on the board; four kids in the district

Jared Callahan (left), GMG director of buildings and grounds, and lead custodian Gayle Beck stand in the center of the boiler room at the secondary school in Garwin on Tuesday, July 30, during a public tour of the building constructed in 1925.

• Ann Jackson — married to a 1994 GMG graduate (Matt Jackson); 11 years on the board; three kids in the district

• Jackie Stonewall — 1986 GMG graduate; nine years on the board; two kids in the district

• Justin Hornberg — 1994 GMG graduate; four years on the board; two kids in the district

• Kristine Kienzle — 2011 graduate; 18 months on the board; two kids in the district

• David Collins — 1988 graduate; one year on the board; four kids in the district

A water-damaged classroom at the 1925 secondary building in Garwin pictured on Tuesday, July 30. The room was one of three heavily damaged this past winter due to burst pipes.

Roberts also introduced Petersen, the district’s new superintendent, who is shared with the Baxter CSD.

“The purpose of our meeting tonight is to be open and transparent with the GMG community about our facilities and discussions,” Roberts said.

Over the last several months, the board has been working with the design-build firm SitelogIQ to determine the best path forward when it comes to the district’s deteriorating 1925 building, which is mostly used as classroom space for students in grades 7-12. Besides the 1925 three-story, brick building, the Garwin complex also features a 1956 addition and a 2008 addition that houses the main gym and science labs.

“The 1925 portion has served us well – for almost 100 years – but frankly, it’s looking pretty tired. And it has posed serious challenges for us over the last several years,” Roberts said.

She went on to describe the basics of Iowa’s school bond referendum process, including the circulation of a petition among the district’s electors asking the school board to call for a special election.

GMG recently began circulating such a petition, which asks the school board to put a public measure to voters in November. If passed with a 60 percent supermajority, it would allow the district to sell general obligation bonds not to exceed $12.3 million in order to “build, furnish, and equip a classroom addition to the middle school/high school, with related remodeling and improvements and related site improvements, including parking; to remodel, repair, and improve its existing middle school/high school, including life safety systems and ADA improvements.”

The need for action

Following Roberts’ introduction, Petersen gave a roughly 10-minute presentation on why the district is exploring a bond referendum. He began by showing a slide of the 1925 building’s most recent rating of its security, mechanical, electrical, and plumbing – all of which fall in the “poor” category.

“Why don’t we just fix up the 1925 building?” Petersen rhetorically asked. “Why don’t we just renovate what’s there?”

He then showed several photos of deteriorating areas in the building including the boiler room which currently only has one functioning steam boiler out of two. He also touched on the fact that the 1925 building lacks restrooms.

Petersen then moved on to a list of “what it would take” to renovate the 1925 building.

The list was lengthy and included new roofing, significant ceiling work, new lighting, asbestos abatement, fire protection, water supply upgrades, electrical upgrades, the construction of an elevator to the third floor, new exterior windows and doors, and mechanical and plumbing upgrades. The list also stated that ADA compliance in the building sits at only 20 percent.

His next slide delved into the “many unknowns” that could drive the cost of a possible renovation even higher including potential cracks in the foundation; the loss of educational space due to ADA compliance which requires wider stairwells and bigger restrooms; operating inefficiencies due to multiple cooling systems and end-of-life boilers; and additional costs such as higher insurance premiums on the century-old building as well as increasing annual maintenance costs.

“Over the past few years, we’ve seen substantial raises in our insurance premiums because we’re making a lot of claims. I think we’ve claimed over half a million dollars mainly in that building – not solely in that building – over the past year and a half,” Petersen said.

If the district were to renovate the 1925 building – bringing it up to ADA compliance as is required by law on new construction – the cost would be $7-8 million at minimum.

“That would probably be the best-case scenario. And we’d still have a 100-year-old building,” Petersen said.

The solution proposed by the school board, he said, is to construct a new, two-story, 22,000-square-foot addition to the east of the main gym. Such an addition would cost no more than $12.3 million and be paid for with general obligation bond proceeds.

At a later date, the 1925 building would subsequently be demolished.

The tour

Following the presentation, the audience was invited to tour, at their leisure, all three levels of the 1925 building including the basement boiler room.

As the public moved from floor to floor and room to room, school board members were available to answer questions; also present were director of buildings and grounds Jared Callahan and lead custodian Gayle Beck, both GMG graduates.

“It’s never the same thing,” Callahan said about issues at the building. “One day it might be a drinking fountain. The next day it’s a burst pipe.”

“It took us three hours once to replace a plug-in because we had to follow the electrical,” Beck said. “It’s a mess. The electrical is a mess. It’s time-consuming and we often come in after hours to do it.”

While walking down the narrow, damp concrete steps to the boiler room, Callahan paused about halfway down in order to point out water that was running out of the wall and dripping down the steps.

“The water just runs out of the wall now,” he said before laughing incredulously. “These are the conditions I have to work in.”

Despite the wet and humid conditions this summer, Callahan said the water that was present all over the floor throughout the decrepit, century-old boiler room was nothing new.

“It’s never really dry in here,” he said. “Ideally, you have electrical in here, it shouldn’t be in a moist area.”

He then pointed to a ground-floor window located near the ceiling. One of the window’s center square panes had something taped over it.

“That window has been broken out since I got here [in April of 2023] and that’s the fix,” Callahan said.

On the east side of the cavernous room, an old ‘FALLOUT SHELTER’ sign clung to the crumbling concrete walls.

“That dates it right there,” Callahan said as he motioned toward the sign.

The district recently spent $90,000 on a new boiler, which is slated to be installed before winter. In the interim, the building has been running on just one boiler.

“This building can’t run off just one boiler when you hit negative temps,” Callahan said.

Pipes in the building burst last winter, causing massive water damage in three classrooms.

“Sadly, this is the showstopper on this floor,” board member Kristine Kienzle said as visitors checked out one of them.

When asked if the third floor was accessible via a chair lift, board member Justin Hornberg replied, “Yes, when it works.”

A good number of the people who chose to tour the building following the formal presentation on July 30 were once students or teachers at the school, and many could be seen shaking their heads at what they saw that evening.

An older gentleman perhaps summed up the tour best with his comment.

“A building this big and this old, if you started to tear into it, you’d never know what you’re going to find,” he said.

A second community meeting will be held tonight, Thursday, Aug. 8, at 7 p.m. in the lower gym using the same format and presentation.

If the district is successful in gathering the petition signatures needed for a Nov. 2024 bond referendum, the school board must pass a resolution and submit paperwork to the controlling county auditor’s office no later than Aug. 28. The referendum would require a supermajority (60% + 1) to pass.