10/16/2024 9:10:30 AM
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Section 18: Worcester County Subject: School Funding Msg# 1213318
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From WMDT:
WORCESTER COUNTY, Md. – Tuesday, Worcester County Commissioners entered a memorandum of understanding with the county Board of Education and Interagency Commission on School Construction, securing $48.9 million in state funding for new facilities at Buckingham Elementary and Berlin Intermediate School. “Buckingham is obviously an aging infrastructure and you take one walk through the school. There’s there’s no question of why that school needs to be replaced,” said Commissioner Eric Fiori, who served on the Buckingham Elementary Replacement School Workgroup. Superintendent Lou Taylor was thrilled by the record funding and the commissioners’ decision to move forward with the project in its current form. “We’ve never received much more than eight or 9 million in the last few years to renovate a school. So we’re real excited as to what happened today,” he said, adding that the need for a new building for Buckingham is two-fold. “Buckingham was built in the seventies. It is not conducive for the learning environment for our young people today. It’s served its purpose at the time…We are running out of space in that school. That area has grown over the last handful of years.” The MOU specifies that $23.1 million of the state’s contribution will go to Berlin Intermediate School. Commissioner Fiori said that combining the projects allowed them to achieve greater efficiency and value. “The ability to negotiate for a multi-school improvement plan or construction plan [is] unprecedented that it’s been done this way. And I think it’s a win-win for us, the state, the students, the teachers, everyone involved in the system.” While Buckingham elementary will be replaced, Berlin Intermediate School could instead see major renovations. “Once they do a feasibility study, we’ll find out how solid the structure is. And if it’s a solid structure, there’s a good possibility we would renovate that,” Superintendent Taylor said. “We will move as quickly as we can on this because we need to get going.” Superintendent Taylor said that for Buckingham elementary, they plan to break ground in the summer of 2027. The memorandum of understanding states that the new Buckingham Elementary School should be open by September 1, 2030. For Berlin Intermediate School, the target date is exactly one year later, September 1, 2031. |
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