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The Pleasanton Unified School District Board of Trustees unanimously approved a roughly $85 million design-build agreement to construct the new athletic and performing arts facilities at Amador Valley High School last week.
During the busy Jan. 16 meeting, the board reviewed some early renderings of the new theater and competition gym, which were debuted to the public for the first time after months of community engagement and input from different key stakeholders.
“I am so excited with these renderings,” said Trustee Laurie Walker — a former administrative secretary at Amador. “Having worked at Amador for several years, this is fantastic. The competition gym just looks beautiful.”
The overall campus renovation project was one of the big ticket items listed in the Measure I bond, which Pleasanton voters approved back in 2023. The $395 million general obligation bond will be funding this and other projects such as the similar renovation of the athletic and performing arts facility at Foothill High School — the board approved the design-build agreement for that project back in November.
According to staff, the agreement was one of the highlights of a busy evening for the board as they laid out how they got to the current designs and what the timeline for the project will look like over these next few years.
Members of the district’s facilities and construction team said they spent a lot of time over the past year engaging with the community and getting user input from stakeholders at the school, the district and the community in order to come up with a design that works for everyone.
After the district issued a request for qualifications in April, 12 firms submitted their qualifications which were reviewed by representatives from the district and Amador. That list of 12 firms was whittled down to three firms.
Those three firms each submitted various designs and prices with various stakeholders before their final designs were presented to a selection committee last September. Through all of that, the committee chose Blach Construction as the firm that will work with Quattrocchi Kwok Architects (QKA) and Gensler Architects to perform the architectural services for the project.
Representatives from the firms said the overall goal of the design for the two new buildings is to “create this avenue of the Dons that connects all the way from Santa Rita road back to the stadium”.
The overall plan is as follows: demolish the existing theater in order to build a new performing arts center; modernize the existing music building; remodel the existing competition gym into a practice gym and locker rooms; tear down the existing small gym; and construct a new competition gym.
According to last week’s presentation, the new competition gym will seat about 1,700 people and will include a lobby with restrooms and a concession area; a new mat room and weight room; and new team rooms.
Staff said they scheduled the timing of construction in a way that allows one gym to be open at all times so that students aren’t too affected by construction.
As for the performing arts facilities, staff said the new theater — which will be built on top of the current one — will seat roughly 500 people and will include educational support spaces in the back, storage rooms and other theater rooms to meet the educational needs of students.
Newly elected Trustee Charlie Jones asked about spaces for theater kids to perform in while the theater is under construction, to which staff said they will have to explore other avenues to host performances. Jones said he hopes the district can work something out with the city in order to use places like the Firehouse Arts Center.
Jones also asked staff about the preservation of any historical aspects of the existing theater — a topic that he and Trustee Mary Jo Carreon said they have heard a lot from the public.
The design team said that they are working on honoring the gateway for the theater while also transitioning to the modern era and that they will try to honor other historical aspects of the current theater as best as possible.
In response to a similar question by Trustee Kelly Mokashi — who is now serving as the vice president of the board — the design team also said they will be looking to save the chandelier inside the current theater but that they are unsure about whether it will have a home in the new performing arts facility or not.
The design team, in response to questions from Mokashi, also assured the public that while they can’t make any changes to things like size of buildings, there is definitely still room for more community involvement and input in order to fine tune the design.
Diana Hasenpflug, an athletic trainer at Amador, decided to do just that during public comments when she asked the board to consider adding an athletic training room in the new gym facility because she is currently working in a portable with no water access.
However, any additions to the project will have to be heavily considered as staff told the board the cost of this new design contract is already higher than the current amount budgeted in Measure I.
In order to address the budget shortfall, the board approved staff’s recommendation to allocate money from different funding sources to the project.
One of the sources will be $1.75 million in insurance funds related to the fire that mysteriously broke out at the Amador small gym in March 2024. Even though the design team said the fire threw a wrench in their plans, that money will help with funding the overall project.
The other two funding sources to make up for the project budget deficit will be from developer fees — the district has $2 million in unallocated developer fee funds — and Measure I1 savings.
Prior to the Amador renovation project item, the board unanimously approved allocating roughly $5.2 million that were saved during Measure I1 projects. Measure I1, a $270 million general obligations bond that residents approved in 2016, funded several infrastructure and safety projects and over the years the district saw significant savings for those projects — most of which have now been completed.
After the approval of reallocating those savings to the Measure I1 program contingency fund — which now has almost $8.4 million — the board agreed to take just over $2.65 million from the contingency fund in order to help finance the Amador project. In total, these three additional funding sources equal about $6,400,000, which staff said will cover the additional funding required for the project.
In regards to the timeline for construction, the design team said they plan to submit their designs to the Division of the State Architect later this year and are aiming to begin construction around March 2026.
The demolition of the existing theater and small gym would take place around summer 2026, which would be followed by the locker room later that same year. The new competition gym would be slated for completion by late 2027 and the new theater is set to be completed by June 2028.
The existing gym renovation is set to finish near the end of the overall project, which is slated to be fully completed by August 2028.
In other business
The board unanimously approved a design-build contract for the construction of the new Educational Options Center, which is set to replace what is currently Village High School.
Another one of the marquee projects funded by the $395 million Measure I bond, the Educational Options Center will replace the former district headquarters and Village High School with a new facility that will house Village High, the Pleasanton Virtual Academy, the adult transition program and other programs.
In the past, staff and district leaders pointed out the need to address the deteriorating buildings and lack of access at the continuation school site and former district offices, which is what led to the new options center.
The creation of the center had been broken up in three phases: constructing interim housing, demolition of the existing campus and building the new facility.
Village High and other programs have already moved into the temporary portables — Jones said he heard the transition wasn’t the smoothest for Village staff and said the future transition to the options center needs to be smoother.
The design team went over how similar to the Amador and Foothill projects, the district worked closely with community stakeholders on the design.
The new campus will be just over 30,000 square feet and will be made up of two levels with a large parking lot on the first and the second level housing all of the buildings. The second level will have a similar feel to downtown Main Street, according to the design team.
“It’s important that every student has an opportunity to excel and the old campus was getting to the point of being unsafe,” Trustee Justin Brown, who is now acting as this year’s board president, said during the Jan. 16 meeting.
“Having a long-term campus for all of our students matters,” he added.
The district budgeted $34,843,101 from its Measure I funds and according to staff, the current project design is within budget.
