Trustees approve plan to proceed with single-point entries at 5 schools

At its Aug. 26 meeting, the Lyon County School District Board of Trustees approved a plan to move forward with a project to implement a single point of entry at five schools using bond funds.

The project will be to install single-point entries for Fernley High, Dayton High, Silver Stage High, Yerington High Schools, and Silverland Middle School, and to remodel space for a culinary lab and JROTC classrooms at Fernley High. Construction should take place during the summer break of 2026.

The district received an opinion of probable cost of $1,468,174.84 by Paul Cavin Architect LLC for the single point entry projects but the actual costs will depend on the bids received for the projects. Under a state law changed by the legislature in 2023, each project will be bid separately. The district will issue general obligation bonds to pay for the projects.

The district plans to issue two separate bond sales of $15 million each over the next two years for maintenance and upgrades, including the single point of entry projects.

The district will choose a construction manager at-risk (CMAR) to manage the projects at Fernley High School and Dayton High School and will solicit bids for the other projects. Harman Bains, the district’s executive director of operations, said a law changed by the legislature only allows school districts in counties with populations of less than 100,000 to utilize a CMAR for two projects a year.

Under the CMAR process, the district would choose a contractor to function as the CMAR, and that contractor would give the district a guaranteed maximum price for the project. The CMAR then oversees all the subcontractors on the project and is responsible for any additional costs. A general contractor is hired after the design process is complete, while a CMAR is involved in the design process.

“The biggest advantage is a guaranteed maximum price, so a CMAR is responsible for any changes within the project once it’s gone out to bid unless we request something that is not within the project,” Bains said. “We do want to leverage CMARs for our big projects.”

For Yerington and Silver Stage high schools and Silverland Middle School, the district will be required to hire a general contractor. Unlike a CMAR project, state law requires the district to accept the lowest bid in a general contractor project. Bains said the projects at Yerington and Silver Stage will each require two general contractors, one to focus on the construction and the second to focus on the storefront and doors.

“Storefront and doors we want separated, because that is a specialty,” Bains said. “We don’t want a general contractor that doesn’t do that to win the lowest bid and then try to piecemeal the work together.”