Edmond Public Schools OKs bids for more storm shelters

EDMOND — Thanks to a $100 million investment, all Edmond School District campuses are only a few years away from providing maximum tornado protection for nearly 25,000 students and 2,750 personnel.

On Monday, the Edmond Board of Education approved bids for two more storm shelters.

Jenco Construction of Oklahoma City was awarded $3.7 million to build a second shelter at Edmond Santa Fe High School. The facility also will be used for a band room as well as a robotics classroom. W.L. McNatt Construction of Oklahoma City was awarded $1.8 million for a shelter at Northern Hills Elementary School.

With construction on those shelters expecting to take 14 months each, the five-member board also approved plans and authorized bidding to start for Chisholm Elementary School. That shelter will double as a media center.

Justin Coffelt, the district’s chief operating officer, predicted 95 percent of all the shelter work would be done by 2021.

Before the meeting, Superintendent Bret Towne reflected on the decision to protect 18 elementary schools, six middle schools and three high schools.

“This was in response to student safety,” Towne said. “After Moore, we decided to make every school safe.”

On May 20, 2013, seven Moore schoolchildren were among those killed when a deadly EF-5 twister struck that town.

Edmond schools built after 1990 have shelters or underground protection. The district started adding reinforced storm protection for older schools.

Coffelt said such shelters are now complete at Clyde Howell, John Ross, Sunset, Clegern, Russell Dougherty and Orvis Risner, all elementary schools.

Ida Freeman Elementary is wrapping up construction and should be ready in June, Coffelt said. Central Middle School has begun construction on a shelter, which Coffelt predicted would be ready by fall 2019.

Because of higher school enrollment, high schools will be equipped with two shelters each. One is done at Santa Fe on the west side, and construction soon will begin on the other one.

In June, construction will begin on a shelter at Edmond North High School.

In a few years, a second shelter will be built on the west side of the school. The school now uses the Siberian Gym as a shelter. It’s a similar story at Edmond Memorial High School, where one shelter will open in the fall and another in a few years, after the new, revamped football stadium is completed.

Some campuses have storm protection now, but not with standards that fully meet Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) specifications. Sequoyah Middle School will have a practice gym double as a shelter, with construction set to start in 2019. Sequoyah, with berms, now has underground protection.

Some schools, such as Will Rogers Elementary, will undergo what Coffelt called a “hardening.” Long, sturdy beams will be drilled in the cafeteria floor and into the slab this summer. Those beams will provide extra support to the roof. Doors, built to withstand high winds, also will be installed.

Newer schools, such as Centennial Elementary and Heartland Middle School, were built with shelters meeting FEMA standards.

The shelter work has been funded by bond issue packages that were passed in 2015 and 2017. Last year’s bond passed with more than 80 percent of voter support.

“We are fortunate that we’re in a community that made this happen,” Coffelt said. “The district, parents and everyone is appreciative.”