After nearly six years of construction setbacks, the Dos Pueblos High School Elings Center for Creative Learning is nearing its final stages of construction, with only the flooring and other finishing touches remaining before completion.
“I don’t want to jinx anything, but we are in the home stretch,” Principal Bill Woodard said.
The center was originally expected to open in September 2022, but faced multiple delays, including pandemic-related supply chain issues in 2020 and severe water intrusion in early 2024, which forced nearly total demolition of the building to make repairs.
The Santa Barbara Unified School District ultimately ended its contract with TELACU Construction Management after their failure to comply with contractual obligations. A new contract with Liberty Mutual Insurance was signed, giving them full responsibility of the project, with RJT Construction Inc. overseeing the process.
According to Woodard, since the contracting change, most of the work has been thoroughly completed. Last school year, scaffolding and fencing surrounded the site, but for the entirety of this school year, the building has been cleared of both.
“They are going more methodical than I was expecting,” Woodard said about Liberty Mutual. “They were testing everything along the way. So we have not had any issues since we started with them.”
The final steps toward completion include finishing touch-ups on the floor tile and working through a “punch list,” a checklist of tasks and inspections before the project can be considered complete. The time required to finish a punch list can vary, so no official opening date has been set.
However, DPHS administrators are hopeful that the center will be ready by this fall. Dos Pueblos Engineering Academy Director Emily Shaeer believes when the center opens it will “transform opportunities” for students as well as the broader community.
“We want to celebrate student innovation, and we want to do that beyond the walls of these classrooms,” Shaeer said.
Shaeer explained that the finished center will be a space similar to a gallery showcase, a place where students can interact and see student work on display that can inspire others.
“We want something more interactive,” Shaeer said. “Something that can inspire young people when they come here on field trips–to imagine themselves as future makers and innovators.”
Steve Venz, the Chief Operations Officer for the Santa Barbara Unified School District did not respond to requests for comment.
