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County officials, school board discuss planned bus garage
By Justin Goble
County officials met with members of the school board Monday (Sept. 8) to discuss plans for a new school bus garage.
Commissioners announced Feb. 18 that they had purchased the former Southern Lumber property, which includes several structures and 5.12 acres, for approximately $2 million. That property will be used to house the new garage, along with the county transit and county maintenance offices. Current plans also include office areas that the county will use in the future.
The current school bus garage, which is off N.C. 116, will be turned over to Southwestern Community College. The college will in turn use that space for campus expansion along with constructing an access road to N.C. 107.
Architects John Cort and Bruce Youngberg of Asheville-based Cort Architectural Group laid out the plans for officials Monday night. According to Youngberg, plans include parking spaces for 65 buses, two regular school bus bays, a lift bay and a drive-through bay for school use. There will also be two lift bays for regular county vehicles, a lift bay for county transit vehicles and a drive-through bay for county use. In addition the facility will include shared wash bays and gas pumps, along with inventory rooms for both school and county vehicles.
Cort said an extension would have to be built onto the current warehouse to have enough bays for both county and school vehicles. A spray booth will also have to be constructed, he said.
“This was all planned out according to guidelines set forth by the Department of Public Instruction,” Cort said. “All of this is based on accepted knowledge in the state of North Carolina. It’s a logical layout and has good delineation.”
The only problem with the site Cort said he saw was the ability to obtain right of ways. Currently Southern Railroad owns the right of way, which would prevent officials from configuring the site to allow big trucks to pull out onto Skyland Drive.
“If a truck brings a bus in the drive through bays for repairs, it would be nice if they could go straight out onto the road,” he said. “As it is they can turn around, but it’s tight. What we have there is like a small subdivision street.”
Originally, commissioners estimated renovations at the site to run $2.2 million. However, Cort said those figures didn’t account for the additional structures that are called for in the plans. Though he didn’t have figures for what those additions will cost, Cort said it was safe to assume that officials will need to increase the project’s budget by one-and-a-half times its current level.
Faced with that information, Commissioner William Shelton asked if some of the spaces could be combined and used by both county and school employees.
“Is there any way we can share things like rest rooms and break rooms?” he asked. “That might help cut costs a lot.”
Jackson County Schools Superintendant Sue Nations pointed out that state statute requires the bus garage to have its own dedicated space. Transportation Director Mark Hooper agreed, saying that allows officials to keep track of their inventory, which includes things like car batteries, tires and other equipment.
Hooper also noted that, in the current plans, break areas and rest rooms for county and school employees lie at opposite ends of the warehouse. If those were to be shared, they would need to be moved to the center of the facility, where the bus bays would be.
“You need that space for the buses,” Hooper said. “The height of those ceilings allows for the buses to come in for repairs.”
Commissioner Tom Massie said he thought it would be fine if people using the facility had to walk to one end of the site to use the rest room or the break room. However, school board Chairman Ken Henke disagreed.
“I don’t want to step on anyone’s feelings, but you have to remember one thing,” Henke said. “If someone’s been driving a bus all day and the first thing they have to do when they’re done is use the bathroom, that’s going to be the most important room in the world to them.”
Commissioner Mark Jones said he understood the difficulties in trying to combine such areas. While the plans are expected to cost more than commissioners had thought, he said he would support moving forward as long as officials continue to try and find ways to save money on the project.
“I know it’s more than we had planned on,” he said. “But if they can show that they’re trying to cut costs wherever they can, I’m in favor of the plan.”
When asked how she felt about the plans, Nations said she was fine with them as they stood. Though the county has been adding things to the building, she said the space required for the school buses has remained the same throughout the planning process.
“It’s never made any difference to us,” Nations said. “Our space has stayed the same ever since we started talking about this. It’s been a constant for us. As long as the plans are met with your approval, we’re glad we’re getting a new facility.”
After both boards came to a tentative agreement on the plans, Massie discussed the draft agreement over use of the facilities that school board members brought to commissioners. In the draft document, county officials will lease facilities to the school system for $1 a year in perpetuity.
Massie said he would like to see some kind of time limit put on that lease.
“I don’t want it to go on forever,” he said. “I would like to see some limit on that.”
School board attorney Chris Campbell suggested 30-year lease terms, with options for renewal at the end of each term.
“At the very least, that allows both boards to get together and make sure the relationship is still a good working one,” he said. “We can address any problems and make sure everything is OK.”
Massie also questioned a clause in the agreement that requires at least 65 spaces be available for school buses at all times. He said that during the school year many buses would be parked at the schools, leaving many spaces at the garage vacant.
He suggested changing that language to make sure there was “adequate space” to park buses at the site. That would allow the county to park decommissioned vehicles at the Stovall property until they are auctioned off.
School board member Mark Brooks said he could agree with that as long as school buses are given priority. Commissioners agreed with that stipulation by consensus.
Officials recessed Monday’s work session and are set to reconvene it Monday, Oct. 6, at 5 p.m. to continue bus garage discussions.
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