School District Giving $150,000 To Trails Group

The Glenwood Community School District is giving $150,000 to a group planning to build a series of walking trails in Mills County.

The donation to the Mills County Trails Board, which will be paid over three years, will go toward the group’s effort to build a proposed trail network that would link Glenwood Lake Park with the city’s recreation complex and athletic fields on the east side of Keg Creek. The district’s contribution is earmarked for the trail head of that project located at the former earth lodge site lot along Keg Creek and Sharp Street. The site, which will house a restroom facility and is expected to serve as a staging area and parking lot for the trail, is owned by the Glenwood Community School District. The parking lot is expected to hold up to 100 vehicles.

Glenwood Community School District Superintendent Devin Embray said the money for the trails group will come out of the district’s Secure an Advanced Vision for Education (SAVE) dollars it receives through its one-cent sales tax levy fund. The money will be paid out over three years.

Embray went on to say the district had always intended to put a parking lot on the site along with a pedestrian bridge connecting the lot to the athletic complex. Helping that project come to fruition while assisting the trails project get to its financial goals is a nice bonus that benefits both entities.

“If we can do this and allow the trail committee to apply for more grants and get more money for the trails project, and help grow that project, we thought it would help us both out,” Embray said. “This (parking lot) was something we planned to do in the future and since the money is over a 36- month period, we had the ability to budget that.”

The pedestrian bridge over Keg Creek that currently connects the Glenwood soccer fields and the athletic complex further to the north is scheduled to be replaced as part of the district’s $3.7 million facilities upgrade. That project is expected to begin this Fall and be completed by Fall of 2019.

The trails committee continues to seek donations and grants to fund the project that is expected to be completed within 24 months.

Embray said the trail head parking lot is a priority of the trails committee and he expects that project and the new athletic complex’s completion dates to be closely aligned.

In other school board news:

* The board approved a contract with 10 Men, LLC to replace the roofs at both West and Northeast Elementary Schools. The total cost to replace the roofs, which was last done more than 20 years ago, Embray said, will cost about $270,000.

* The board approved a professional services agreement with Spiral Communications to maintain the district’s wired and wireless networks along with server maintenance. The annual cost of the contract is $102,840.

* The board approved a 2.5-percent benefit increase for administrators, department directors and other non-union staff.

* A meeting is being planned for later this month to discuss the site plan and design of the district’s planned $3.7 million Glenwood Athletic Complex upgrade. HSR, Inc., the project architects, is expected to unveil the latest design plans at the meeting with the district’s design committee. The district hopes to lock the final design shortly after and send the project out for bid by mid-July. Embray said they hope to begin construction in October.

A date for that meeting has yet to be confirmed.