PARIS – The vote was unanimous – 59 in favor, no one against.

All 59 of the SAD 17 district voters who attended Monday’s meeting outlining the concept design of the new $12 million Paris Elementary School liked what they saw.

But Monday’s straw poll approving the concept design for a 450-student elementary school on High Street is just one more step in a lengthy, state-required approval process, Supt. Mark Eastman told the gathering at Oxford Hills Comprehensive High School.

Despite being ranked third on a statewide priority list and despite having looked at 22 sites before choosing the High Street location, Eastman said he can only hope for final design approval from the Department of Education by next February. Construction could then begin that summer, and be completed by December 2006.

Eastman said the final concept design approved recently by the Department of Education wasn’t the same as that envisioned at first by the Building Committee.

Soon after design talks began with the state education department, it became clear the district would need to be assertive, or accept “the cookie cutter approach” for new school design that favors regionalization and larger-scale schools, he said.

Spokes of a wheel

“We made nine trips up and back to Augusta” to work out differences in design details, Eastman said.

The new Paris school has been designed with a “school-within-a-school” approach, said design architect Richard Malm of Bucksport, who also designed the Hebron Station Elementary School.

Grades kindergarten, one and two would be in one wing, with grades three and four in another. Grades five and six would be on the second floor over one of the wings.

Each area would have classrooms and tutorial space that are connected, like spokes on a wheel, to a central area for group presentations. The library and administrative area are centrally located.

On the left side of the school, facing High Street, would be the gym, stage, music and art room, and two spaces off the gym to pilot a new in-school pre-kindergarten program that would operate independently from the rest of the school.

Eastman said the state is favoring flat roofs for new school construction, but the school is designed to have two areas of pitched-roof construction, in part for aesthetics, in part to allow for central air conditioning.

Designed for 75 years

Eastman said the time is coming when schools will need to be open year-round, and the Paris school has been designed to serve the district for the next 75 years.

The next step is to win district support for a $600,000 share in local funding for the school, which represents 5 percent of the total cost. A tentative, districtwide referendum on that funding has been set for Sept. 5.

Enrollment projections call for around 420 students to walk through the doors when the school opens, but the design allows for some expansion.

The land for the High Street school is bordered by two side streets – Hathaway Road and Meadow Lane – and is bordered in the rear by the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railroad tracks.

Eastman and the architect each said there was much discussion about the proximity of the tracks to the school, but the tracks are well-screened by a wooded area and a chain-link fence will be built around the site’s rear perimeter.

Current plans call for one access to the school from High Street. But Eastman said the district is talking to Paris municipal leaders, who would like to see the district consider changing the access to Meadow Lane.