A postponed Lexington middle school is back on board agenda. It could cost nearly $100M

A revised plan for a postponed new middle school on Lexington’s Polo Club Boulevard is on the agenda for Monday’s Fayette school board meeting, costing $49 million more than in June 2021.

A divided school board postponed plans for the school in November 2021, when costs rose from $47.2 million to $70.5 million. The cost of the proposed project now before the school board is $96.2 million, according to documents attached to Monday’s agenda.

The school board is being asked to send the project back out for bidding with the goal of opening the school in August 2025.

“The prices have continued to escalate, but space is still needed for our students to alleviate overcrowding at our current middle schools,” said the agenda document.

The problems, district officials said in the document, are that prices have continued to rise for new construction and the time it takes for delivering materials is of greater concern.

The proposed building would be approximately 171,983 square feet to serve 1,200 students.

The district has recently bought property on Versailles Road with the intention of building both a new elementary and a Girls’ K-8 STEM school and is renovating the old Herald-Leader building near downtown for a state of the art career and technical center.

The school district bought the Polo Club property for a middle school as well as a new elementary school in 2020.

This story was originally published June 10, 2022 at 5:07 PM.