New elementary school plan approved for $21.6 million

To the passerby of Lumpkin County, the lot at 216 Pinetree Way may just look like a bunch of dirt. But for Greg Trammell, it signifies the future.
“It just takes your breath when you see what we’re doing for the future of kids in Lumpkin County,” Trammell said. “To have them in a facility like this with a playground and roads for parents to come in and out of and stage cars before they get on the highway to relieve some of that traffic. I don’t know if you could do anything any better anywhere else than this right here.”
And after Monday night’s school board meeting, we now know exactly how much that future is going to cost.
The Lumpkin County Board of Education voted to pass the Guaranteed Maximum Price (GMP) for the new Lumpkin County Elementary School to be located at the site at $21,655,808.
“We’ve been back and forth with Carroll Daniel [Construction] to get some of those packages down, so we come to you with a GMP today of $21,655,808,” Lumpkin County superintendent Dr. Rob Brown told the board during the Monday work session. “That is guaranteed, all in, but also includes, and this is an important piece, $1.2 million of contingency funds….We’re very comfortable with this number, with where we are. I told Greg, anything under $22 or $22.5 [million] I think we’ve got a great deal for what we’re going to be building. So now that we’re at $21.6 with over a million dollars in contingencies, I’m feeling great about it.”
Trammell, who serves as chief operations officer over Lumpkin County schools, said the number is “about 2.3 or 2.4 under what we had budget for, or what Carroll Daniel had told us what it was going to cost.” To Trammell, this means the county saves that money and can spend it on other needs for its students.
“The thing I think is important is because of the market, the price we planned for was $2 million more, so now that’s $2 million that can go to serve our kids in some other capacity in the system,” he said following the meeting.
Brown also said the price seems to be well under what other schools are being built for across the nation.
“With that square footage, it prices at about $188 a square foot,” he said. “I was looking through one of the magazines that comes to you today with school buildings and every one of the square footage prices were between $240 a square foot to $330 a square foot, so we’re really coming in at a good spot.”
After the GMP number was presented, the board was shown updated renderings showing what the most up-to-date plans for the school look to be at the moment.
“Obviously we’re a long way from selecting brick or rock or colors or anything like that, but this is the gist of the renderings anyway,” Brown said of a rendering showing the design of the front of the new school.
The board seemed pleased with all of the updates and voted in unanimously to approve the proposed GMP. Boardmember Jim McClure was most vocal about how the plans are coming along.
“I just think this is an amazing site for Lumpkin County and for us to be able to put an elementary school on,” McClure said. “It’s almost hard to believe. I think this is the premier site in the city of Dahlonega.”
When asked by McClure, Brown confirmed that the school is still on track to be finished before the 2023 school year begins.