BELLE — The Maries County R-2 Board of Education met with Integrity Engineering’s Terris Cates on April 26 to discuss the specifications of a new HVAC system at Belle elementary and high schools.

Superintendent Dr. Lenice Basham explained to the board that they needed to hire a company to complete the specifications work before the district could send the project out for bid. Integrity Engineering is the only company that responded to the district’s request to complete the spec work.

Cates attended the April 26 meeting to explain the work needed.

Cates reviewed that the district’s current system is outdated and costly. 

“You have a two-stage compressor programmed as a one-stage compressor,” Cates explained. “It probably costs $50,000-$60,000 a year in maintenance. I can’t imagine what your electric bill must be. The most cost-effective thing you can do is do away with it.”

Cates recommended a chiller system since the district already has a boiler.

“We would use a chiller on the east side of the Belle Elementary School (BES) near the church,” Cates said.

The project could be completed in three stages but would be more cost-effective if the district could do it all at once. Cates believes a 40-ton chiller would be too big.

“We need to do a load study, look at how much we need for the AC, and get the load amount down,” he said. “If we don’t, it will be over-designed and will not run efficiently.”

He told board members that an oversized chiller won’t run effectively. Ideally, the chiller will run through the current boiling system’s pipes. 

“It would run the chiller through the boiler lines rather than bringing in Ameren service at BES and later BHS,” Cates said.

He also pointed out that there are numerous problems with the amount of humidity within the buildings, and he thought it could be the soffits or barriers that were incorrectly installed.

“I was talking to Tony (Gieck, maintenance director) and I think we can get this out around $595,714 to $714,000 to do the job,” Cates said.

Cates said Integrity is not bidding, he was just informing them about the current pricing.

The district is not planning to begin the project until the 2023-24 school year. They hope to have more control over the temperatures in each classroom and have quieter units.

Gieck mentioned that with around $25,000 more to the overall project, the district could complete the job all at once.

“We could do the load study on the whole elementary school,” Cates said. “It would be for the best long-term and economically to do it all at once. If this is an option you want to consider, you are saving a lot of money.”

Gieck and Cates agreed that they don’t want to have the same problems each time if they complete the job in stages.

The board and the superintendent agreed that they would like to see a load study for both options. The current units were installed in 1993 and are due to be replaced.

The board approved 7-0 to allow Integrity Engineering to move forward with a load study to determine what bid specifications should be advertised.