By Clay LePard
clepard@cbs4qc.com
After more than a century, renovations are on the way for one Davenport school.
For the past 12 years, building a new pool and auditorium at Central High School has been a top priority.
But every year, it kept getting pushed back. And now, after one school board member spoke up, change is on its way.
The Davenport school board will choose an architect on March 11th for a new auditorium and pool.
The auditorium at Central was built in 1904 and, for the most part, has pretty much stayed the same, even the antique lights.
"Someone has to climb into the ceiling and actually crank them down," says Robert Scott, Principal at Central High School. "They are on the old hoist where they bring them down to change the lights and then hoist them back up."
"It's the same auditorium with the same number of seats and they're not comfortable," says Patt Zamora, Davenport School Board member. "In the 1960s, they were renovated in green and orange and other ugly colors."
But it hasn't been easy getting the school board behind Central's requests. After proposals recently passed for renovations at West High School and North High School, Zamora said she'd had enough.
"It seems to be that before we do anything somewhere else, we should honor the commitment to give Central their new auditorium and pool," she says.
One school board member argues it wasn't preferential treatment for the other schools.
"The North decision and the West decision were easier decisions," says Ken Krumwiede, Vice President of the Davenport School Board. "It's because we have confined space at Central that the issue has been 'how can we do this' and 'where will we put it' and 'how's it going to impact other parts of the building and areas around the building.'"
Central school leaders hope the new auditorium and pool will be finished in the next three years.
