Bristol Warren Regional School District is moving to replace Mount Hope High School in Bristol, Rhode Island, a building from the 1960s that has accumulated years of deferred maintenance, accessibility problems, and outdated systems that officials say can no longer be patched with repairs.

The district is now seeking contractors for construction of the new high school along with capital improvements at other schools across the district. The project has been years in the making, shaped in large part by a once-in-a-generation shift in how Rhode Island funds school construction.

The push traces back to a 2017 statewide facilities assessment by Jacobs Engineering that found roughly $2.2 billion in needed repairs across Rhode Island schools, with many buildings rated in poor or unsatisfactory condition. Rhode Island's schools are among the oldest in the nation on average. Voters responded in 2018 by approving a $250 million school construction bond, the first major state investment in school facilities in decades, and followed it with a second $250 million bond in 2022. The state also raised its reimbursement rate for approved projects, with bonus incentives for energy efficiency and other factors that can push the state's share above 50 to 60 percent of total costs. Bristol Warren voters approved a local bond to cover the district's share.

Those bonus incentives don't last forever. The deadline has been extended multiple times, but the window is closing, and districts across the state have been racing to get projects into bidding before the enhanced reimbursements expire. Bristol Warren is one of dozens of Rhode Island districts rushing major construction through this pipeline at roughly the same time, a dynamic that has driven up construction costs statewide and created a tight bidding environment.

Mount Hope High School serves roughly 850 to 900 students from the towns of Bristol and Warren, which formed one of Rhode Island's earliest regional school districts in 1991. The two towns have occasionally clashed over cost-sharing given their different tax bases, and like much of Rhode Island, the district faces longer-term enrollment declines that will factor into how the new building is sized.

Contractor selection will determine the project timeline, and whether the district can break ground in time to fully capitalize on the state's bonus reimbursements.