DONALDSONVILLE The Ascension Parish School Board this week approved the apparent low bid of $3.5 million for the renovation of flood-damaged St. Amant Primary School.

Chad Lynch, director of planning and construction for the school district, said the bid, from McInnis Brothers of Minden, came in well under the $4.1 million his office had projected for the project.

Superintendent David Alexander said the St. Amant Primary project is expected to be completed some time in December.

Work on the four other schools that remain closed due to flooding St. Amant High, Lake Elementary, Galvez Middle and Galvez Primary is in the architectural design phase.

Repair work at another school, St. Amant Middle, which received some flood damage but was able to remain open, is out for bid.

In recent weeks, the student bodies of St. Amant High, Lake Elementary and Galvez Primary have returned to their home campuses, where large, temporary classroom buildings have been installed until the school buildings are repaired.

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Galvez Primary School students and faculty returned to their home campus on March 2, in Prai

St. Amant Primary students, who had been attending classes at two host sites, are now reunited at the former location of the River Parishes Community College on La. 22 in Sorrento.

Alexander said it is highly likely that students at the fifth flood-damaged school, Galvez Middle, will be able to return by Monday to their own campus, where temporary buildings have been set up, but the school district won't have the official word on that until the Fire Marshal's inspection, planned for Friday.

In another matter Tuesday, School Board member Robyn Delaney asked that the board's Students and Safety Committee meet to discuss the incident on March 3, when a herbicide being sprayed on sugar cane fields next to Donaldsonville Primary led to a two-hour shelter-in-place order for the primary school, as well as nearby Ascension Head Start and the School Board's central office.

"That school is surrounded on three sides by cane fields," said Delaney. "I want to know if there's more work we can do to make it safe."

DONALDSONVILLE A farmer spraying sugar cane fields with herbicide on a windy Friday mornin

Delaney asked that officials with the Ascension Parish Office of Emergency Preparedness and Homeland Security and the Sheriff's Office be invited to the meeting, as well as the administrators of Donaldsonville Primary.

Follow Ellyn Couvillion on Twitter, @EllynCouvillion.

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Ascension Parish School Board awards first bid for flood damage ... - The Advocate