Bristol Twp. School District Administration, Transportation, & Operations Start Move

The former Clara Barton Elementary School is about to become the Bristol Township School District Administration Building.

After some delays, the new building that will house administration, operations, and transportation is nearing its opening. The first school board meeting is expected to be held in the building in August.

Bob Maloney, the operations director for the Bristol Township School District, said moving would be underway this week as various departments head from the administration’s current home in the Ben Franklin School on Mill Creek Road.

The majority of the buses and vans that sit a the Franklin property will move to the new transportation depot at the new facility later this summer, Maloney said.

District Business Manager Josh Sweigard said the operations yard at the former Delhaas High School property on Veterans Highway (Route 413), which the district rents from the firm that has turned the old school into an office building, will move to the revovated district-owned building soon. The move will save the district money on the lease it paid for the operations center.

In recent years, the district consolidated its transportation lot from a commercial rental property along Green Lane to the Franklin school in advance of the new transportation center.

Buses will access the new district hub from Green Lane thanks to two new driveways constructed.

The project to renovate the former school turned administration, operations, and transportation center took part in several phases. The first was environmental abatement of the building, an Act 39 Guaranteed Energy Savings Act project to upgrade the building, creation of the infrastructure for transportation facility, and restoring the property that backs up to homes in the Blue Ridge neighborhood and Harry S. Truman High School.

The district’s long-term goal is to close the aging Franklin D. Roosevelt Middle School on Veterans Highway and move students to the Ben Franklin School, which has been well maintained over the years. There has not been a timeline announced for the move, but it will not be in the 2019-2020 school year.

Maloney said while the administration will be moving out of the Franklin school, there will still be some operations at the site until the district’s long-term middle school goal is realized.