The White County School District on Tuesday held a groundbreaking for a brand new performing arts center at the former site of White County High School's baseball field.
Scott Justus, assistant superintendent with White County Schools, said the district had been having conversations about the project for a little over a year leading up to the groundbreaking. Charles Black Construction will build the facility, and Breaux and Associates did the architecture work on the project.
"We're moving along, hoping to open by [the time] school starts in 2023," Justus said. "Worst case scenario would be Christmas."
The facility will house band, chorus and theatre, and will seat about 700 people. White County High School currently has a theatre that seats about 350 to 400 people.
"We will have an administrator designated for scheduling pieces of the building, so it will definitely tie in with our middle and elementary school theatre programs and their performances," Justus said. "We'll be able to make this a whole school system building."
Justus said the project is being paid for thanks to help from the county's ESPLOST.
The facility will be built where the baseball field was once located. Justus said this will allow for some upgrades to the baseball and softball fields, which will be moved to the left of the football field.
"We're actually going to grade it so we can phase in an athletic building, potentially, and potential tennis courts," Justus said.
The school has other construction projects underway, including a new transportation facility located off Testanee Gap Road.
"Our bus drivers and our transportation directors and our people that work in our transportation are super excited," Justus said. "It's going to have new technologies, new buildings ... it's actually going to have more bays, a couple of things are electronic in there that we just haven't had."
Justus said Superintendent Laurie Burkett was the driving force behind these big projects.
