School kitchen nears

The Libby school district has placed a call for bids to renovate the kitchen at the Libby High School.

The new kitchen has been part of the school district’s strategic plan for years, although in August of 2013, they rejected the kitchen plan due to financial concerns.

Craig Barringer, the new superintendent, said the kitchen will serve high school and middle school students this coming school year, and the district will assess in 2015 if the service should be expanded to the elementary school.

Barringer said the money for the kitchen has been saved for years in the building maintenance fund in the district’s budget.

In 2013, the  school district said it was facing a $700,000 budget deficit. The district asked voters to approve a tax increase to pay for teacher salaries, building improvements and to keep up with other costs. The levy did not pass. 

Barringer said the kitchen remodeling project is predicted to cost between $198,000 and $250,000, depending on the bids received.

He said the final tally of the cost of the kitchen will be determined when the district looks over the bids and consults with the district’s consultant Jackola Engineering & Architecture, PC, a Kalispell-based architecture firm.

The new kitchen plan will tear down the former kitchen’s walls and expand the kitchen a few feet forward into the cafeteria space. Boardmember Ellen Johnston said an exciting part of the plan is that there will be both a preparation and a serving line. 

Barringer said a test on the kitchen conducted by contractor Kirby Environmental was negative for asbestos. He said the kitchen project is expected to finish in October, and since this lapses into the coming school year, the area where the food will be prepared will be in a different room on the school site. Barringer said students will still eat in the cafeteria.

Relying on the vendor-provided food proved too much for the district after the death of Sandy Cook and the loss of the contract of Frank Hendrickson’s catering company. Cook was killed in a rollover crash in 2013. 

Boardmember Bruce Sickler said after all of these developments with the vendors, the kitchen project became a high priority. Board members also realized that the district has enough money to pay for the project.

Sickler and Johnston said the kitchen plan has been on the school board’s strategic plan for three or four years.

“It think it’s the appropriate time,” Sickler said. “It’s really something that we need.”

The kitchen currently is a small, tight space, cluttered with industrial food supply equipment and wooden shelves. 

Kirby Maki, the former superintendent, said the current kitchen space at the Libby Middle High School is inadequate to serve the children of the district. 

Although the district bought Cook’s equipment after her passing to alleviate costs, the cramped space in the high school pales in comparison to the new kitchen plan. 

“We were kind of hanging on the string with the vendors,” Maki said. “It’s nothing against them, but we need to take control, and a state-of-the-art kitchen would help us move forward.”

Bids for the remodeling should be delivered to 724 Louisiana Ave. before 3 p.m. on Aug. 7.