Work begins at Dist. 70's Copeland School

Contractors will begin moving dirt soon to start what will be a very busy summer of construction in Libertyville District 70.

The first project to get under way is a $1.8 million addition to Copeland Manor school.

That works involves building a multipurpose room with an attached kitchen, one classroom, two small group instruction rooms and renovating the bathrooms, which are original 1957 vintage.

Life safety work, which includes updating alarms and electrical systems was well as asbestos removal, also is planned.

The work is being funded from a previously issued bond and proceeds from the sale of the old Central School totaling $7.5 million.

That money already has financed improvements at Adler and Butterfield schools and also will be used next year to replace science labs at Highland Middle School.

"We're actually doing work at four schools by the time we're done," said Kurt Valentin, assistant superintendent of finance and operations.

This summer, the district will spend about $4.5 million for a new roof at Butterfield and replacing most of the roof at Highland.

The bid for the project was about $500,000 below estimates, according to district officials.

Altogether, about 200,000 square feet of roof, equivalent to the area of nearly four professional football fields, will be replaced.

Roofs at both schools are about 40 years old and leak during storms.

Two solar panels will be installed on each building, which will provide some energy savings and continue a district pledge to reduce its carbon footprint.

Contractors also will finish installing air conditioning in the rest of Highland and install remote controls on the cooling and heating systems, for energy efficiency.

Valentin said a poor economy prompted more bids and lower prices.

"We had 16 bidders on the Copeland project," he said. "We had five bidders on Adler last year."