L. Merion awards contracts for new Rosemont high school

After years of debate and delays, the Lower Merion School District board last night approved construction bids for a new Harriton High School on the site in Rosemont where the current school stands.

The construction bids, approved by a unanimous vote, were for $80.5 million, about $4.7 million more than the school board had planned for in August, when it authorized the project.

Adding in the professional fees, furniture and equipment purchases and $4.8 million for a new Harriton High athletic stadium, the total project cost is estimated at $102.9 million.

"No one can dispute that these schools are totally inadequate," School Board President Lawrence Rosenwald said of the two current high schools. "It's time to stop the analysis and move forward."

Work is scheduled to begin on the new high school within a few weeks; the building is scheduled to open in the fall of 2009. The current high school building, opened in 1958, will be demolished.

About 60 people attended last night's board meeting, and members of the audience addressed the board before the vote.

One of them was Harriton High junior Ben Goldberg, who called the current campus "inadequate and overcrowded."

"It is high time that our facility reflect the quality of the Harriton community," he told the board. "I hope you will agree that the students come first."

Lower Merion resident Bob Guzzardi told the board he opposed the current plan.

"There is no evidence that this money is going to bring a return on our investment," Guzzardi said.

He called for a community vote on the project. "The entire community needs to be involved in this process," Guzzardi said.

Plans are also in the works for a new Lower Merion High School on the building's current site in Ardmore.

If that project proceeds according to schedule, work could begin as early as next spring, and the school would open in 2010. District officials said that each of the two new schools would have an enrollment of 1,250; total district enrollment is 6,945.

The debate over what to do with the two high schools has been going on for more than a decade.

In the late 1990s, the school board leaned toward renovating Harriton and Lower Merion, instead of building new schools. In May 2001, it changed course and approved the concept of putting up two new buildings. But the election of several new board members later that year who questioned the plan led to more rounds of discussions.

Last August, the board unanimously agreed to put Harriton out for construction bids. But in February, the bids came in almost $7 million higher than the board had planned for. The high school was put out for bids again with some technical changes and changes in building materials that were designed to elicit lower offers. One general contractor - Boro Construction - responded; that bid, and bids for the rest of the work, were approved last night.