New Lame Deer school is a lemon; district pushes for corrective action

LAME DEER Bill Parker got out of his truck and pointed to the new, partially finished, sand-colored school building sitting just across the parking lot from his office at the Lame Deer School District administration building.

"It's not finished," said Parker, the district's new superintendent. "We ran out of money."

In all, $5.6 million has been spent on the construction of the single-story, nine-classroom building that includes a library and an unfinished space that may be the cafeteria or the computer lab.

The school, which sits in the heart of the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation, was supposed to be finished a year ago. Instead, large sections of the exterior walls still lack brickwork and inside the building, much of the southern half of the school is just steel girders and concrete.

Frustrating, to be sure. The unfinished construction has created a space crunch for about half the district's students.

To accommodate the students, the stage above the high school's old gymnasium has been divided and converted into classrooms. The boys' locker room became the school's counseling center; the hot-air hand-dryer sits directly behind the counselor's desk. The principal's office is set up in the gym's lobby.

"We're flexible and we're making do with what we have," said Sherry Foote, the school's principal. "We'll get through this."

However, it's not the delays that really worry school officials; it's the troubling lack of quality in the work that has been done so far. That's where the district plans to take action.

"We're just trying to get to the bottom of it," said Rob McLean, the school board's new chairman.

The problems start immediately at the school's entrance. The slick metal roof above the double doors continually spills snow and slush onto the stepsleading up to the school.

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New Lame Deer school is a lemon; district pushes for corrective action