Putnam County Schools purchasing an estimated 2-acre property to expand the Monterey High School campus.
Deputy Director of Schools Tim Martin said the $95,000 property is adjacent to the school. Martin said Monterey High School has been a crammed campus since it was first built.
“We just don’t have any room to expand on,” Martin said. “There’s not a lot of room for parking around that area, so we don’t really have exact plans for the property, but I think it could be used for just about anything.”
Martin said the school system has kicked around the idea of turning the property into more parking or an athletic facility. Martin said the school system jumped on the opportunity to purchase the property after the owner offered to sell it, despite having a tight budget this fiscal year.
“Budget is always a concern, and that’s the reason why I really can’t give you a timeline today on when that property will be usable, because we are gonna have to spend some money on it to make it usable,” Martin said. “That may take us going through the budget process in order to get the money to do that.”
Martin said the kind of work that needs to be done on the property is extensive.
“It’s covered with trees, and it’s got some buildings on it that we are gonna have to get rid of,” Martin said. “So there will be quite a bit of work that we have to do on it before it is usable for the school.”
Martin said there is also a stream that runs across the property that will have to be mitigated. Martin said the school system will work with Monterey High School administrators to determine the purpose of the newly obtained property.
