McCarthy Building Companies recently began an $18M new construction and renovation project at the Western Maricopa Education Center (West-MEC) Northeast Campus located at 1617 W. Williams Drive in Phoenix.
The West-MEC Northeast Campus is one of four planned projects for the career and technical public school district funded by a $74.9M voter-approved bond. The Northeast Campus will host programs including veterinary assisting, medical assisting, HVAC-R, and auto collision industries. In future years, the district will also provide programs such as construction technology, electrical, plumbing, and pharmacy assisting at the Northeast Campus.
“With the addition of our Northeast Campus, West-MEC will have specialized career and technical facilities to improve the educational experience for our students. Each program offered at this campus will be aligned to industry standards and equip students will technical skills and career certifications that will lead to jobs,” said West-MEC Superintendent Gregory Donovan. “We have a strong partnership with McCarthy Building Companies and the DLR Group; they see the value in developing a skilled, sustainable workforce that is well prepared for high-demand jobs.”
Construction began last month and is set to complete in July 2014. This includes remodeling two existing buildings comprising of 71,000 square feet and 13,000 square feet respectively, as well as, adding two new buildings, totaling 23,000 square feet and 17,000 square feet.
The larger existing building has two stories and will be transformed into classrooms, teacher spaces and technical labs. The smaller building will be remodeled into a new auto repair training facility with vehicle lifts, classrooms and working labs. The new 23,000 SF building will house a veterinarian program with lab space, animal holding rooms, surgery and waiting rooms. The new 17,000 square-foot building will provide training programs for auto collision repair with a paint booth, classrooms, technical labs and workspace.
The campus will be incorporating energy-efficient components to reduce operating costs. An upgrade to a more effective lighting system will increase the light output while decreasing the wattage and energy consumption. The district will be receiving a rebate from APS for its energy-saving efforts.
“This is our third project with the West-MEC and DLR team,” said Justin Kelton, Education Services team leader for McCarthy Building Companies Southwest Division. “We completed West-MEC’s Aviation Training Center in April 2011, and are in the final stages of a new classroom building on that campus. The Northeast campus is a particularly exciting project because one of the programs that will be available at the campus is West-MEC’s construction technology curriculum, so building the venue where our future workforce will be trained is a special opportunity,” he added.
