Agreement between town and school stuck in limbo

“We need to move forward now”

The architects and planners working on the expansion and renovation plans for the Crested Butte Community School are getting nervous as the intergovernmental agreement (IGA) between the town of Crested Butte and the school district continues to go unsigned.

“We need to move forward now. Otherwise, not having the IGA in place will start to slow us up,” said Mike Archbold, head architect for the district renovation projects. “If we can get something signed this week that would be ideal.”
Expanding the CBCS as planned requires a piece of town property that holds a ball field to the south of the school. Once the town and the school district agree on the conditions of the IGA, the document can be signed and the land will be transferred to allow construction to move forward.
“What we need from the IGA is, obviously, the site piece, as well as the road access [to the school property] and what’s all included with the relocation of the ball field. Those are all critical in determining how and when we can start on the high school end. Otherwise we won’t be able to start that this summer and it will push us back most of a year,” said Archbold.
Blythe Group & Co., which is managing the design and construction of the projects, hopes to have contractors ready to break ground on the school expansion in May.
Before that can happen, the property has to be cleared of a town barn and the ball field and the site prepared for construction.
A meeting between representatives of the school district and Crested Butte town manager Susan Parker is scheduled for Thursday, February 12 in Crested Butte when the group will take another look at the document, which has been in the works since November.
Any changes made will go to attorneys from both sides for review and then, if the attorneys agree to it, the IGA will go to the school board and the town council for possible approval.
“We will sit down and go through the latest version, number seven, and spend from 11 a.m. until whenever, trying to have the i’s dotted and t’s crossed,” said superintendent Jon Nelson.
When asked whether or not the document would be ready for approval after Thursday’s discussion, Nelson said, “I’m not going out on a limb.”
If the IGA is ready, the earliest opportunity the town council would have to sign the document would be a regular meeting Tuesday, February 17 and the school board would be able to review it at a regular meeting the following week, Monday, February 23.
“If we need to have a special meeting, depending on how the town moves on this on Thursday, we can schedule that at any time. We certainly don’t want to hold up Mike [Archbold] and his crew from moving forward,” said Nelson. “To do that we have to have the property or have more than reasonable assurance that it won’t be hung up and the property will be ours.”