Leone & Keeble Inc., of Spokane, has landed a $10.6 million contract to renovate the Davenport School District's elementary school and to build a middle-school addition onto it.

The district, located about 36 miles west of Spokane, has operated with an elementary school that housed students in prekindergarten through sixth grade, and a combined junior and senior high school.

The project will expand and renovate the elementary school so it also can house seventh- and eighth-grade classes, says Jim Kowalkowski, Davenport school district superintendent.

He says the project, which is scheduled for completion in June 2012, will add about 23,000 square feet of floor space to the about 38,000-square-foot elementary school.

The school, located at 1101 Seventh Street, currently has 13 classrooms, but that number will be increased to 16, and the new middle-school wing will have nine classrooms, Kowalkowski says.

"We have big classes in the grade school. This project gives the school district space to absorb larger classes" as they move up to the high school, he says. The Davenport secondary school, located at 801 Seventh Street, was renovated about eight years ago, he says.

The elementary school project was designed by the Pullman, Wash., office of Design West Architects PA, of Meridian, Idaho.

Leone & Keeble is expected to begin work on the project at the end of August, says Kowalkowski. During the first year of the project, the contractor will construct the middle-school addition and a new gymnasium, and classes won't be impacted significantly during that stage of work, Kowalkowski says. During the 2011-2012 school year, elementary classes will be moved to the new middle school wing and four portable classrooms. The elementary school, built in 1948, then will be gutted down to the weight-bearing walls and renovated, he says.

The renovation will include new heating, ventilation and air-conditioning systems, plumbing, wiring, and energy-efficient windows. Classrooms will have mounted video projectors connected to the teachers' computers and ceiling speakers, Kowalkowski says.

Leone & Keeble's base bid totaled $8.9 million. Its bid suggested 21 additional alternate projects, such as a track on the playfield and bleachers in the gymnasium, he says. All but three of those alternate projects were awarded, bringing the contract up to $10.6 million.

The total project, estimated at $14.3 million, will be paid for with a $7.3 million school bond approved by Davenport voters and with a matching grant from the Washington state Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction, Kowalkowski says.