The newest executive director of the state School Building Authority didn’t have a lot of time to mull things over last week.
In fact, Andy Neptune said he had to go for a pretty quick fix, out of necessity.
He got the call from the governor’s office Friday morning and was told he needed to be in his new office Monday morning.
So, the longtime teacher and administrator for Marion County Schools dug out his suitcase and gassed up his car for the nearly three-hour cruise from his driveway in Barrackville – to the state capitol in Charleston.
There, he plopped down said suitcase and set out introducing himself to SBA staff. He even had an audience with Babydog.
“OK, that was cool,” he said.
Neptune is taking over for David Roach, who became state school superintendent over the summer.
The School Building Authority is the state agency that doles out the dollars for new construction and major renovations across West Virginia’s 55 school districts.
Neptune, meanwhile, knows all about quick fixes and big projects.
Up until last week, he was the head of maintenance and facilities management for the district next door.
A number of Marion’s school buildings and other structures are hitting the century mark.
The original Mannington High School, now a middle school, dates back to 1925.
Fairmont Senior High is right there, too, with its 1928 time-stamp.
And the city’s multiuse East-West Stadium was constructed in 1938, as part of President Franklin Roosevelt’s Works Progress Administration.
Don’t forget the former high schools of Fairview, Monongah, Rivesville and Neptune’s hometown Barrackville – all very much in use as middle schools today.
Meanwhile, the old Farmington High was lost to mine subsidence in the early 1970s.
Over the years, the county has worked around buildings adorned with architectural time-period details that needed preserving, even as the whole deal was being retrofitted for school safety measures – reflecting a new order in Appalachia and America.
They dealt with roofs covered by worn-out shingles that were longer manufactured, even.
And concrete walls with a bunker-thickness of 4 feet – which didn’t make for easy drilling, as the county found out in the 1990s when the first of Marion’s schools were being wired for the internet.
He most recently oversaw a turf-replacement project at East-West Stadium and installation of a 10-lane track at North Marion High School.
“We have a great maintenance staff in Marion County Schools,” he said. “They’re a blessing.”
Marion County is just like Mountain State’s 54 other counties, he said: Coal camp communities and little towns all being true to their school – even if said school is in a new incarnation.
Neptune majored in education at Fairmont State and took his first job as a teacher at East Dale Elementary 34 years ago.
“It’s about respect,” he said.
“It’s about giving our students, and our teachers and our service personnel a place where they can be safe and comfortable during the school day.”
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