School board president says there are more options than proposed renovation project

BEDFORD, Pa. (WTAJ) — The Bedford Area School Board is moving forward with the bidding process on the proposed $46 million renovation to the high school.

When the board voted to proceed with the bid process back on August 20 , the vote was followed by a PowerPoint presentation from School Board President Col. Ricky Miller titled ‘What is Plan B.’

The presentation drew pushback and criticism from several school board members and those in attendance. Miller spoke with WTAJ News on Tuesday about the proposed project and why he felt the presentation was necessary.

“It’s just a simple question what is plan b,” Miller said. “This is not our only option. If anything, ask the superintendent to name one thing that prevented us from opening Bedford High School for this school year just a few weeks ago.”

In the presentation, Miller expressed his reservations about the project because other proposed ones in the past have been turned down because the bids came in too high, like in 2021. Miller says that he wants the board to be prepared if the bids come in higher than expected due to material and construction costs.

He also questions whether a school that size is needed.

“Whenever I graduated from Bedford High School in 1980 my class size was 227,” Miller said. “We graduated 135 kids in 2024, that’s a big difference.”

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Miller said that he doesn’t know what they expect the design life of the 100-year-old building to be. One of the options that he proposed in the presentation was the possibility of building a new, small combination middle school and high school.

“Like Richland, like Forest Hills,”Miller said. “They got an elementary school and then they got a combination junior/senior high school. Is that something that we should be looking at as well?”

The school board will be opening bids for the project on Oct, 1 at 1 p.m.

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