Design Discussions Continue For New School In Cookeville

Property purchased for a new school in southwest Cookeville has enough building space to house a K-8 facility.

That according to Upland Design Group’s Kim Chamberlin.

“We feel comfortable that we can easily get somewhere between 150,000  to 180,000 square feet of building space on the property with athletic fields,” Chamberlin said. “We knew we were looking at a baseball field and a softball field, and then what we’re showing would be a combination of a football and soccer field. We think the property works in this regard and keeps us out of the most expensive property to develop.”

Chamberlin presented drawings of the proposal to the Putnam County Board of Education during Thursday night’s meeting. He said the plan would avoid all but one of the four identified wetlands on the 45-acre property.

“We will need to look at that area and be able to mitigate that,” Chamberlin said. “We can either do that onsite or offsite in bank property. It would probably be more cost-effective to do that offsite in bank property. It basically means that you’re contributing to a fund that’s creating wetlands.”

The board has not yet made a decision on the specific type of school that will be built. They plan to make that decision before the end of the year.