Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, March 5, 1991                   TAG: 9103050250
SECTION: CURRENT                    PAGE: NRV1   EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY 
SOURCE: New River Valley bureau
DATELINE: CHRISTIANSBURG                                LENGTH: Short

$3.6 MILLION BID TO BE RECOMMENDED FOR NEW SCHOOL

The Montgomery County School Board will be asked tonight to accept the bid for construction of the school from the John S. Clark Co. of Mount Airy, N.C.

Clark's bid of $3,597,150 was the lowest from among 11 potential contractors.

The school, which will be built on Falling Branch Road in eastern Christiansburg, will house up to 500 students in kindergarten through fifth grade.

At tonight's meeting, the board also will be asked to authorize the sale and issuance of $3.25 million in general obligation bonds to help pay for the new school.

"We've got everything going our way on the Christiansburg site," Superintendent Harold Dodge told the Board of Supervisors at a budget meeting on Saturday.

The original estimated cost for construction, not including a separate contract for site preparation, was $3.95 million.

Some savings from that cost had been expected. Because of the depressed construction market the building's architect, Smithey & Boynton, had forecast that the bids would be $200,000 below the original estimate.

The second and third low bidders on the Christiansburg school were Stanley W. Bowles of Martinsville at $3.72 million and Burwill Construction Co. of Bristol, Tenn., at $3.728 million.

With the buyers market, the architects are saying that now is the time to move on a proposed new West Blacksburg school, Dodge told the supervisors.