The decommissioning of the north end of Rose Valley School topped the list of Horizon School Division’s capital projects last year, coming in at just over $352,000.

The building needed to have some reconstruction done and the student population had dropped to around 100 students over the years, director of education Kevin Garinger said.

The old north wing, which the division was continually trying to address, was finally decommissioned, he said. Some classrooms and the entrance were also renovated.

“A lot of that school had been redone - it’s been a number of years now - but it’s still a beautiful, beautiful school. This other end was an older section of the school and it really needed to go.”

Other high-costing projects in the $2.1 million capital budget included gym upgrades in Punnichy Community High School and Wakaw, and replacing a boiler in Rose Valley.

The division has re-done about 10 gym floors over the past few years, Garinger said. More gym projects are coming down the pipe this year, as well as office reconstruction and science labs, he said.

The division is also looking at which school roofs need to be replaced. Those projects cost almost as much as the entire capital budget so require additional cash from the province, Garinger said.

Until those projects are approved, the division repairs roofs to keep them operable, he said.

“We’ve had to do that sometimes, but ultimately roofs have end of life types of times and we need to address that as well.”