The Great Bend USD 428 Board of Education voted Monday to purchase the property at 625 E. 10th Street owned by Central Power Systems & Services for $1,550,000.

Superintendent Khris Thexton said the site will be for maintenance, transportation, custodial and grounds services, and for food service.

“Currently there’s not a food service facility in that (location) but it will be part of our plan to add that in the near future,” Thexton said.

Last May, the board approved making an offer for an undisclosed price on 904 Washington and 25 16 9th St. – formerly Becker Tire and later Best-One Tire – but that purchase never happened.

“We made the offer and it just didn’t work out,” Thexton said. “The timing didn’t work out.”

Then, as now, the district was looking for a site for a new support services complex. Central Power Systems is relocating to Garden City.

Thexton estimated the facility is just under 33,000 square feet and will replace facilities with a total area of about 20,000 square feet.

The district will go through the process outlined by Kansas statute, hiring a Construction Manager at Risk. It will probably take 30 to 60 days to take ownership of the property and then the district will be ready to move maintenance, transportation and grounds. “When we add the kitchen, that’s when the architects and engineers will get involved," he said.

“It’s estimated at $2.6 million to renovate that whole facility, so we’ll be in about $4.6 million to get that all finished,” Thexton said. The district has the money in its capital outlay fund. Renovations will also require board approval.

Assistant Superintendent John Popp said the administration is excited with this opportunity, which will cost less than new construction. During the 2019 bond election, which failed, the district proposed using land it already owns to building a complex next to the district education center.

“If we were to build this facility over here, in our last bond we were talking close to $10 million to do that,” Popp said. “So buying and renovating is way cheaper than trying to build this new – and I think the cost would be a lot higher now than it was in the bond.”

Thexton said the administration was interested when the Central Power Systems property became available and checked with the district architect to see if it would meet the district’s needs. He did most of the negotiating and this all came together over the past two weeks.