The school now houses Chicopee Academy on the third floor and some school offices on the first floor.
The former Chicopee High School building is shown on the last day of classes before closing in 2004.CHICOPEE – The building committee overseeing proposed renovations of the former Chicopee High School has finished the first step in the project and is now hoping students will be able to move in by September 2013.
The committee recently received final approval from the state School Building Authority to hire Arcadis U.S. to serve as project manager on the renovations. The company was selected by the committee about three weeks ago after the committee interviewed several candidates, said William M. Zaskey, City Council president and chairman of the building committee.
The city is planning to renovate the old Chicopee High School and convert it into a middle school. Once the renovation is complete, it will move sixth, seventh and eighth-graders from the Fairview Veterans Memorial Middle School, reuse that school for elementary grades and make other changes as well.
“Now we will be putting out a request for proposals for architects,” Zaskey said.
The committee will release the names of those who responded to the state. The architect will then be selected by a board of 15, three of whom will be from the building commission and the rest by the state School Building Authority, he said.
Once the architect is selected, the committee will have a better idea of the scope of the project and the cost, Zaskey said.
Preliminary estimates predict the school could be renovated for $15 million. City officials are hoping the state will reimburse 65 to 70 percent of the costs of the work.
Superintendent Richard W. Rege Jr. said he is hoping the renovations can begin in the spring and can be finished in a year so teachers can move in over the summer of 2013.
With the existing Fairview Middle School located on the opposite side of the city, Rege said school officials will need more time to move and do not want to have to do it over a long weekend or a week-long vacation.
Making the change will solve some overcrowding problems for the school department. It will also finally move school officials out of the Helen O’Connell administration building, which has serious structural problems. Chicopee Academy, the city’s alternative school that now occupies the third floor of the old Chicopee High School, will also finally get a permanent home after having moved three times.
“It give us flexibility on what we can do,” Rege said.