MEXICO – The Region 9 board has come to a price agreement with the owner of an adjacent land parcel that would allow a major renovation and building project at the vocational school.

Now all that’s needed is approval to go ahead by a majority of voters in the 16-town region.

Board Chairman Norman Clanton said the Finance Committee met with the rest of the board in a closed session following the regular meeting Tuesday night. He said he cannot disclose the agreed upon price, nor the precise amount of land that the money will purchase.

“The land is sufficient to meet the needs of the project,” he said Wednesday night.

Planned is a 17,000-square-foot addition that would allow two of the existing programs to move into the building, and two new vocational programs in automotive technology and early childhood development. Also, a major renovation is planned to the existing building, along with interior work that will bring the River Road building up to fire and safety codes, and into compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act.

The project is estimated to cost $4.9 million, with about $1.5 million coming from the state in grants or no-interest loans. The rest would be bonded over a 20-year period.

Clanton would not disclose the agreed upon price for the property. If the project is voted down, the sale would not go through, and the earnest money given to property owner Alan Archibald would be returned to Region 9, he said.

If approved, this would be the first addition of new vocational programs in the region’s nearly 30-year-old history. The renovation would be the first since the school moved into the building more than seven years ago.

Also on Tuesday, the Communications Committee of the board put together a fact sheet on the project that will be printed in the Bethel Citizen, Rumford Falls Times and Sun Journal. Letters will be mailed to former students and their parents asking them to vote, and a 23-minute video is being aired over the local access channel.

In other business, the board referred a request to grant senior privileges to the Policy Committee for review. Such privileges, if granted, would allow senior class students to leave the school’s campus during lunchtime and when the student has no classes scheduled.

Clanton said the school has never considered senior privileges in the past.