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player ready...The first phase of construction has begun at Hinsdale Central and Hinsdale South high schools as the contractor takes advantage of the empty buildings, closed due to the coronavirus.
At this point, the construction team has not been advised there will be a shortage of manpower or materials that would delay the projects that were planned to start after the regular school year ended in May.
Workers have begun removing parts of the roof at Central and demolishing the library at South, architect Nick Graal of Arcon Associates told Hinsdale High School District 86’s Joint Facilities and Special Committee Friday morning.
Other projects at both schools included in the district’s $139 million referendum that will be tackled in the next few months include new tennis courts, new turf in the stadiums and practice fields, and improvements to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act.
At Hinsdale South, a new boiler and renovating the special education department are both part of the first phase of work.
The lead time for some parts and equipment from ordering to delivery has been extended due to shutdowns related to the COVID-19 pandemic, but a lot of the big mechanical and electrical units for Hinsdale South are on schedule to be delivered in early May, Graal said.
The work will not go full steam ahead until the district decides whether students will return to school in person this school year or not, Graal said.
That decision will depend in large part on direction and guidance from local, state and national health organizations and government agencies, district officials said.
The construction team is looking ahead to what will be needed in subsequent steps of each project to make sure once started, a job can proceed.
“We don’t want to jump in with both feet,” and find contractor A or B cannot get what he needs for his part of the job, said Marty Platten of Pepper Construction, the district’s construction manager for the referendum projects.
That includes having enough healthy workers.
Manpower has not been a problem so far, the construction team said. Electricians are already working on infrastructure in the schools, and plumbers and the heating and ventilation crews will soon follow.
Pepper has a long relationship with the subcontractors it’s using, Platten said.
“We really have a lot of good partners,” he said.
One delay they anticipate, however, is getting approval for the plan for new pools from the Illinois Department of Public Health. The application to build new pools at Central and South was submitted to the state agency in about February, but the person who would have reviewed it has been reassigned to a lab in Springfield to do COVID-19 testing, Graal said.
“The (Illinois public health department) has pretty much put all non-essential items on the back burner. They are dealing with a health crisis,” Graal said.
Fortunately, the pools are not part of the first phase of construction, so the district has some time before the health department’s approval of the pools becomes critical, he said.