Contracts approved for work at West Bemis, ECH

The July meeting of the Jackson-Madison County School Board was a short one that took care of a few details for projects within the district in the last month before classes are set to resume in August.

The Board officially approved contracts for a pair of small construction projects at different schools.

The concession stand at West Bemis Middle is being renovated, and the entrance to JCM Early College High is also getting renovated to make it more secure.

MSB Construction is renovating the concession stand. The contract for the work is set to cost JMCSS $34,000 with a 60-day deadline for completion once the district officially gives the company the go-ahead to get the work done. MSB will be fined $500 per day for any day over that 60-day agreement it takes to complete the work.

Allison Contracting has a similar agreement with the district for the Early College High secure entrance. That cost is $59,363 with the 60-day deadline and the $500-per-day fine for going over that deadline. School district attorney Dale Thomas said indications are the work shouldn’t take more than two weeks to complete once they get started, but the agreement officially has the 60-day deadline.

Board member Jason Compton did ask ECH Principal Nathan Lewis, who was in attendance at the meeting, how much of a disruption the project would be if it’s happening while classes are going on. Lewis said they can work around it as needed for a few days.

The board approved a third agreement, this one with Vaughn Architects for $7,500. Vaughn is drawing up a design for a pair of classrooms at Jackson Careers and Technology to be divided into four classrooms. Thomas said it’s his understanding the actual renovation work would be handled in-house, but Vaughn is drawing up the plans for the JMCSS employees to execute to produce two more classrooms.

The board also approved a $2.3 million agreement with ParCou Custodial Cleaning Services to handle janitorial services at all JMCSS schools for the upcoming year. At the end of a year, there will be an option for a two-year extension, but a price increase would have to be known before the district would decide that.

ParCou will have all of August and September to execute an interim plan of staffing to ensure all schools are sufficiently cleaned, but the company and the district will work together to officially approve a permanent plan by Sept. 30 based on how things go in August and September. If any schools are understaffed based on that agreement, the district will get a prorate back from the amount paid for that month’s work.

The contract does allow JMCSS to terminate the agreement with 30 days’ notice if job performance isn’t up to standard.

Board Chairman James “Pete” Johnson remarked that such provisions hadn’t been in place in prior custodial agreements. Board member Andre Darnall said those provisions should be good to ensure efficiency in services for the district.

One final piece of business was in reference to the resubmission of an application for a charter school by American Classical Education. Deputy Superintendent Vivian Williams said the charter review team will meet this week and submit a recommendation to the board members based on their findings, and Johnson called for a special called meeting for July 25 at 9:30 a.m. to discuss the application.

ACE submitted an application this past spring – its second try at bringing a charter school to JMCSS. That application was officially rejected in April, but they had 30 days to submit a revised application, which they did. The school board has until July 28 to decide to approve or reject this version of the application.

Brandon Shields, brandon@jacksonpost.news