Board to vote on funds to replace main Wheeler High building

By Gertha Coffee

The Atlanta Journal-Constitution

Water drips through the roof every now and then, students work at computers in a converted storage closet and once in a while a rat peeks through a ceiling crack at East Cobb's Wheeler High School.

Junior Katie Squier said she has shared a photo lab with cockroaches and crickets.

"Our school is actually disgusting, no lie,"  she said.

Staff, parents and students say Wheeler High School, completed in 1965, is overdue for more than a facelift.  The building has received one patch after another to accommodate its 2,106 students, said principal David Chiprany. Now it’s time to demolish the main building and replace it with a facility that would include a new media center, new cafeteria and additional classrooms, he said.

"We are all very excited about it," Chiprany said.

If the Cobb County Board of Education approves the project, work could begin next summer and would take about a year and a half, he said. "We will bring in more portables, so the class work doesn't miss a beat."

The Cobb County school board will vote Thursday on whether to approve SPLOST funding for the $20.3 million project.

Board member John Crooks, who represents Wheeler, has asked for full funding. The facility needs to be  bought up to current district space standards, and the work would eliminate portable classrooms, would modernize electrical and plumbing systems and improve traffic flow, according to the meeting agenda.

The scope of the work, which was presented at a recent board work session by Foreman Seeley Fountain Architecture in Norcross, also includes repaving parking lots, replacing the retaining wall at the baseball field and replacing aluminum exterior doors with hollow metal doors and frames.

Except for $1.3 million that would come from state Department of Education capital outlay funds, the project would be paid for by SPLOST III.

The main question has been whether the funds could come from SPLOST II, board spokesman Jay Dillon said. The original plan was to use SPLOST II, but that strategy was reconsidered because of legal concerns, Dillon said.

"I think they will do what is best for the school," Squier said. "Even though it might be disruptive, a new school is best for the school."

Assistant principal Charles Braddock said Wheeler's staff and students have had to "make do by being innovative."

It was his idea, for example, to turn the storage closet into a computer lab.

"You have to think out of the box," he said. "We do what we do with the space we've got."

A group of parents advocating for the project since May when it was presented to the public at Wheeler High School were told funding was not available, said Wheeler parent Star Riviere.

She's hoping board members will approve money for the project Thursday night.

"It's like your fiance coming to you and showing you a new engagement ring and saying, ‘I love you, but I think I'm going to give it to someone else,' Riviere said. "Talk about dangling a carrot. My hopes are high, but anything can happen. "