Fallen pillar to stay down until others can be moved
An Evans Middle School pillar knocked over by a school bus in October will remain on its side for the foreseeable future, school officials have said.
Columbia County school officials have decided to leave the fallen pillar at Evans Middle School where it is until all the pillars are moved to a new location.
Photo by Jim Blaylock
"I decided that we're not going to do anything until we determine what to do with the rest of the pillars," Columbia County Schools Associate Superintendent Charles Nagle said. "There's no use in paying someone to come give us an estimate of repair until we move them."
The Evans Middle property was sold earlier this year to developers who plan to raze the current school on the corner of Washington and Belair roads and build an upscale shopping center.
School board members are still debating what to do with the pillars and arch, the only reminders of the Evans Consolidated School that burned down in 1955, that line the front of Evans Middle.
"We were debating on maybe splitting them between the (new) Evans Middle and Evans High," Board Chairwoman Roxanne Whitaker said. "We're still not sure. I have not heard anything further."
Work crews are currently clearing land on Hereford Farm Road that will be the site of a new Evans Middle School, which is scheduled to open in 2006.
"We don't have to vacate that premises until the Evans Middle is complete," Whitaker said. "We're just going to wait right now."
Until then, the nearly bisected pillar will lie on a grassy patch between the Evans Middle parking lot and Washington Road.
"We're going to leave it laying right where it is," Nagle said. "When the board decides what we're going to do with all the others and when we hire someone to come in and move them, we'll get an estimate."