The Cornwall Central School District Board of Education has decided on a scoreboard for the new Cornwall Central High School athletic field complex.

At last week’s BOE meeting, they authorized the purchase of a $135,969 video scoreboard, as part of the 2022 Capital Improvements Project. It will be purchased from Digital Scoreboard (as part of Omnia Partners, a group purchasing organization).

The vote to purchase the scoreboard was 6-3, with all members of the board present at the meeting. There was an alternate choice, also on last week’s agenda, of a digital scoreboard for $115,009, but after months of discussion by the board and its Facilities Committee, the enhanced scoreboard was approved.

Creagan said being under budget was probably the deciding factor in that vote.

“I believe most of our members agreed that the video scoreboard was a superior product, there were concerns about going over the original budgeted amount if that would take away from other projects within the schools’ buildings,” he said.

“When we received the final bids in October, we knew that we were under budget by slightly more than $400,000 so the BOE felt comfortable to allocate some of those funds to pay for the video scoreboard.”

The work on the $20,089,674 total project – including the scoreboard – is expected to be complete in the late Spring of 2025. However, Superintendent of Schools Terry Dade said at the meeting, it will probably be the Fall before the district has complete use of all of its buildings and facilities.

But that’s to be expected. Dade said that they are not planning to have use of the new field for the high school graduation (“we’ll be right in that circle,” he said) or the track for the Spring season.
Board of Education President Jim Creagan addressed the overall project, also last week.

“We’re at a point now where we have awarded all of our bids – or are about to, with some Cornwall-on-Hudson work to be awarded next week,” he said. “And we’re officially under budget. We started out last summer a little rocky, but we have recovered, and we are on time with all the work.”

He went on: “To deliver a project of this magnitude mostly on time, and under budget is really great. We feel pretty good about where we are.”

The board got an update from Palombo Group’s Lou Rodriquez and Bill Devine at the meeting. Devine updated the progress of the various projects, and Rodriguez gave a financial update.

From Devine, he said that they are completing a small punch list of Phase1 items and when that is done Phase 1 will be complete. Phase 1 included new bathrooms, electrical work and new doors at Lee Rd. Elementary; bathrooms, interior doors, parking lot work, new stair railings and a loading dock at Willow Ave. Elementary; and bathrooms and electrical work at Cornwall Central Middle School.
Phase 2 includes the high school athletic fields and some work at CCMS, Lee Rd. (bathrooms and pavement work), and Cornwall-on-Hudson Elementary (new windows and two bathroom replacements).
As for the athletic facilities, the majority of materials have been received; the tennis courts are complete and parking lot improvements have been made. New bleachers were set to arrive on November 11, Devine said, and the work to install them will begin soon.

Creagan noted that if the projects remain under budget, there is expected to be several hundred thousand dollars (the $400,000 Creagan referred to above) left over at the end that they can do some additional small ‘contingency’ projects that were approved by the state.

Assistant Superintendent for Business Harvey Sotland said that the board’s Facilities Committee is already looking at future capital projects as well – “things that weren’t addressed in this one will be up first next time,” he said.