San Marcos CISD approves $7M construction contract for new building

In a 4-2 decision Jan. 17, the San Marcos CISD board of trustees approved a construction contract with Noble General Contractors LLC for a new administration building.

The new building is about 26,000 square feet and will be located at the Owen Goodnight Middle School Campus. It will take an estimated time of 13 months to complete.

According to agenda documents, the building will cost approximately $7,411,100. The contingency fund for the building is $77,000, which gives the contractor and the district extra cushion in case there are other expenditures that come up.

The new building will be used for administration offices like the human resources and finance departments along with School Fuel, a nonprofit organization that provides weekend meals for eligible students. It will also have a boardroom that will serve as a multipurpose room and training facility—something the district does not have, forcing them to use different classrooms for trainings and meetings.

“Right now, we don’t have much space in our district to have new teacher orientation, teacher trainings, so our new administration building will be utilized for that,” said Chief of Communication and Technology Andrew Fernandez.

Majority of funds for this project come from the district’s general fund with additional funds leftover from the 2017 bond project.

“We did have about $5 million leftover,” said SMCISD Chief of Operations Bernie Sandoval. “So we took on various projects in the district, and school board approved that a million dollars of that $5 million can be set aside for this new central office.”