The new Weldon high school and middle school are expected to be substantially completed by August 26 of next year, Superintendent Tammy R. Boone told county commissioners Monday night.

“That is providing that the weather cooperates,” she said. “We are planning and looking at our different possibilities of what we need to do as a school district to be prepared regardless of what our day is. We are hoping that we will have a date sooner than the 26th but just in case it’s not then we’re looking at what our possibilities will be so we can make sure that we get our children into school by way of virtual or however we have to to avoid having to move with the school year already starting.”

Boone said: “Overall, we’re just really excited that things are taking place in Weldon. I am proud to be superintendent of Weldon City Schools and we’re going to do what we need to do to make this project a success as well as any others that may come up.”

Bernard Hall, project manager of CPM Construction, told the board the new main building will be slightly over 100,000 square feet and there will be new football, baseball, and softball fields. The football field will have a track around it. “And as a footnote, the sod of that football field actually went in within the last few weeks.”

The sod was put in this year, he said, so when it’s time for the move the athletic fields will be ready for use.

The existing gym will remain and the school will have two gymnasiums, Hall said.

There was a slight challenge starting out when the project was first bid. “It was over budget. We recognized that we can’t spend money that we don’t have. We lost several months over the front end because we had to repackage bids and had to go through that process but we got to the budgetary requirement that we needed.”

Hall said the company is doing everything it can to expedite the timeframe since school starts in August. “It needs to be sooner but the back history of how we got there is we had to take some extra time on the front end to make sure that the money was there.”

He thanked the commissioners for contributing the 5 percent matching funds for the grant the system received to construct the new facility. “We’re making sure the school has everything (it) needs when they move in and open and we’re making sure we’re within that budget. Everything is lining up to come together in the summer of 2026.”