By Mike Hutchens, UC Schools Communications Director
The ball is finally officially rolling for a planned safe room that will double as a gymnasium on the Union City High School campus.
Union City Schools officials recently received a letter of approval for more than $800,000 as initial funding to begin Phase I of a project that is part of an overall $15M athletic facilities upgrade at UCHS.
Grants from FEMA/TEMA under the Hazard Mitigation Grant Program will pay for roughly 90 percent of that cost through a unique funding opportunity, with Union City Schools responsible for in the neighborhood of $3M.
The initial step in the project will deal with architectural and Geotech work that is expected to take 6-8 months.
Phase 2 – which is the actual construction – will begin afterward and is expected to last from 18-24 months, depending upon weather and other outside factors.
The Union City Council originally gave its approval of the project – which has also included major upgrades of new home seating, state-of-the-art lighting at War Memorial Stadium, and federal compliance requirements – in March of 2025.
There have been lengthy delays in moving forward, however, due to multiple government shutdowns and FEMA restructuring.
“Through no fault of our own, we aren’t as far along with this project as we’d hoped to be – but we’re just as excited now to get things going as we were when we first received approval for the project,” Kennedy told the UC School Board after getting their unanimous blessing to enter into the contract.
“We’ve completed mounds of paperwork, dealt with two government shutdowns, and FEMA losing half its employees during one of those shutdowns. And I believe we’re on our third FEMA director since we first started this venture.
“I’m thrilled that we’re finally moving forward.”
In addition to the safe room for community residents to gather in the event of weather threats, catastrophes, and storms, the domed building will house the Golden Tornado basketball teams and provide additional classrooms.
It will seat nearly 3,000 and be a tremendous upgrade to the current high school gymnasium, which is more than 50 years old.
The safe room will be built in the lot in front of the UC Civic Auditorium.