The Owensboro Public School District is planning to turn a shuttered facility into a regional career and technical education center. The district has purchased the former Texas Gas property, which includes a 160,000 square foot building.
Superintendent Nick Brake says it’s a facility that’s badly needed in Owensboro.
“We’d like everything to be aligned to the local workforce and economic needs of our community," said Dr. Brake. "We feel like it’s an ideal location for that type of activity because of its central location off the bypass and it’s accessible to all the local high schools.”
Dr. Brake says the property on Frederica Street was appraised at $10.5 million dollars, but the district only paid $3 million for it.
“Retrofitting will be pretty easy. We’ve got some work to do as far as some environmental remediation and some work with some HVAC systems and things like that,” said Brake. “Ultimately, the cost is going to be much lower than if we retrofitted it for a traditional school or if we were to go out and build, from ground-up, a new career and tech center.”
He says parts of the building could be in use by next fall and will be used by students in grades 9-12 from several area school districts.