City to spend $1.5 million to relocate engineering office, make way for middle school

The city will spend up to $1.5 million to relocate an engineering department office that will make way for a new middle school in northeast Spokane.

The Spokane City Council unanimously authorized funding for the project on Monday. It will result in the relocation of the Engineering Department’s Construction Management team to the nearby property occupied by the city’s water department.

The current office, of a quirky log cabin design, is planted near the corner of Marietta Avenue and Denver Street.

The money to refurbish a new office at the water department headquarters was borrowed from the Spokane Investment Pool, an internal reserve of funds used to make investments.

The loan will be paid back over the next five years.

The middle school is one of the three new and three replacement middle schools approved by voters in November 2018 through a $495.3 million bond.

The move is just one of several shifts in the city’s operational footprint in northeast Spokane.

The city also plans to relocate a small office and vacate an undeveloped parking lot on land it will sell to Catholic Charities, which plans to build more than 70 units of affordable housing at the property located on North Foothills Drive and North Nevada Street.