Crowd gathers in Gower for groundbreaking
By Marcus Clem
East Buchanan Middle School has for decades required many of its local students to be bused 10 miles away from home and back, but the project to end that is now underway.
The $16 million construction of a new campus situated next to the existing elementary and high school got started on Monday. Voters approved a 65-cent tax levy increase in August 2023 by a margin of 60.67% in favor, authorizing a total levy of up to $5.95 for every $100 in assessed value of taxable property.
The district aims to complete work in time for the 2025-26 school year and close the current middle school in Easton, Missouri, leaving local education consolidated in Gower, Missouri. Superintendent John Newell and the East Buchanan Board of Education, among others, broke ground with ceremonial gold shovels at the site of the future school.
“Our school in Easton is just old, and needs a lot of repairs,” said Bill Rhoad, an Easton native who came on Monday to celebrate the new project. “It’s time to get a new one. And I think it’s a good investment. I’ve got grandkids that’s gonna be getting to go through it, and we’ve supported the school all the way.”
The general contractor for the new middle school is Al J. Mueller Construction Company of St. Joseph, working on blueprints by Incite Design Studio of Kansas City, Missouri. Newell estimated that heavy equipment will be on-site by next week, while the majority of work will be completed during this summer and in the subsequent summer to avoid disrupting activities at the elementary and high schools nearby.
“We knew we couldn’t keep kicking this can down the road,” Newell said. “So, we brought in Incite Design Studio, started doing a long-range facility plan, assessing the current facilities, the feasibility of some new facilities and decided last probably March or so, the Board of Education did, with the 65-cent levy.”
Rhoad said the district has come a long way since consolidation to East Buchanan C-I in 1968. It makes him feel proud, he said, to know that its success has largely been realized by teachers, staff and leadership who grew up in the local area.
“They’ve come back and are teaching in the system they learned in, which I think is a beautiful thing for the community,” he said.
