MHPS Board meeting unveils flipped high school remodel plan, library’s location questioned

Current view of campus as shown by Modus Studio

In a meeting that lasted over two and a half hours, the Mountain Home Public Schools Board of Education passed two board action items and continued discussions on high school campus renovations.

Before the meeting began, the Mountain Home Bomb Squad gave a presentation on the robot they built for the previous season and demonstrated how it worked. The Bomb Squad this year managed to rank in the top five out of over 3,600 teams worldwide.

Chris Knight presented a motion to accept a bid of $31,977 to make necessary repairs on the Junior High parking lot. The last routine maintenance was performed in 2019 and the includes seal coating, crack sealing and line repainting. After the motion was presented, concerns were raised about the lack of bids obtained as only one bid was presented for board consideration. Board policy usually requires at least three bids to be presented or at the very least making a good effort to obtain three bids. Despite these concerns, the motion passed.
A motion to purchase new Chrome Books for the 2025-26 school year was presented by Steve Mendleski. Bid requests were evaluated with Mendleski recommending bidder #2 for a total cost of $176,800. The motion was passed.

After the two board action items, a workshop was held with a presentation by Josh Seibert of Modus Studio Inc. to discuss renovations for the high school campus. During a previous workshop, four models were proposed for the renovations and this time Seibert produced a fifth option. The new option is a flipped version of the fourth model previously discussed which would preserve the road and transform the library into a cafeteria.

One primary concern with the remodel is the state of the library. While many are opposed to removing or repurposing the library building, many on the board argue that in the long run maintaining the library in its current state will end up costing more money. Discussion heavily focused on coming up with a solution which will allow for growth and reduce costs over time, rather than a plan which will be cheap in the short term but require constant patching.

Towards the end of the meeting, board members discussed potential new options which had not been considered before with different ideas on where to place buildings. The meeting ended with the board requesting Seibert to bring new ideas and pricing to the next meeting.

Click the following link to see the proposal presented by Modus Studio.  MHHS Modus Proposal Doc.

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