AC Dudley awarded $104.7M contract for new high school in Auburn
Couresy / Harriman Associates
A rendering of the planned Edward Little High School in Auburn, which is expected to be completed for the 2023-24 school year.
Construction will begin today on a $104.7 million high school in Auburn after the school committee Wednesday night awarded the contract to AC Dudley contractors, of Standish.
The contractor was the lower of two bidders; the other was Landry/French Construction, of Scarborough. Both came in higher than the $104.7 million alloted for the project. Dudley's final bid was $105,412,219 and Landry/French came in at $108,500,000.
The state in 2018 approved up to $122 million for the project, the biggest price tag in state history for a new high school — the previous was $100 million Sanford High School, which opened in 2018. Auburn will pay $14 million of the cost.
Edward Little High School has 1,032 students. City officials have said not only is the old high school falling apart and out of date, but they want a school that will be a draw for prospective residents. Discussion of a new school has been going on for more than a decade, with the state first approving the move in 2011.
The 280,000-square-foot building, to be built on the site of the current Edward Little High School, is expected to be completed in time for the 2023-24 school year. The architect and engineer on the project is Harriman Associates, of Auburn. The old building will be torn down once the new one is opened, and work on athletic fields and more is expected to continue for another year.
The project is on the same schedule set when it was first approved, and the city issued a news release Friday warning motorists that construction would begin today, once the contract was awarded, and traffic would be rerouted for the duration of the project.
"We're looking forward to getting a quick start on the school so we can deliver it on time," Arthur Dudley, of AC Dudley, told WMTW-TV.
The building replaces the one built on the 56.25-acre site at 77 Harris St. in 1961. The school committee considered 47 locations in the city before settling on the same site in 2018.
The school will have state-of-the-art classrooms and labs, geothermal heating and cooling, a 1,200-seat auditorium, an 1,870-seat athletic stadium and a gym. Voters polled during the planning stages said a top priority was to have all athletic fields onsite, which the new project has.
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