ALLENTOWN — The steel body of the new middle school is being erected.

The gymnasium area of the new school is the first part of the building taking shape on the site off Breza Road. Upper Freehold Regional Middle School Principal Mark Guterl recently signed one of the beams — he will be the first principal of the school.

Voters approved the facility in a $36 million referendum in 2004 and a $13.2 million referendum in 2007.

The school district has thus far spent $6 million of the money allotted for the project, expected to be completed for a September 2010 opening, according to the school district's auditor.

During the Board of Education's Dec. 17 meeting, the board unanimously voted to authorize and accept bids for the construction of a sanitary sewer and pump station for the new school. The board also affirmed its intention to connect to Allentown's municipally owned and operated sanitary sewer system for service to the middle school campus.

During the meeting, Bill Skillman, a construction manager from Hill International in Marlton, gave the board an update on other progress with the project.

He said the school is 10.2 percent complete, with all of the facility's foundations laid and the steel being erected. As the steel of each part of the facility is erected, workers can start putting slab on the grade, he said. He noted that only extremely low temperatures would halt progress once the workers start working on the slab.

"Even if the cold weather slows down the slab on grade, it does not impact the masonry," he said. "Once the masonry is done, next it's the walls."

Skillman also told the board that the five contractors on the job are doing everything possible to keep on schedule despite having to fight with mud at the site.

"Everything is a slow process in the mud," he said. "I'm comfortable about getting out of the ground by January. I feel good about the schedule. I feel good about our team. The contractors could be fighting with us because of the site conditions, but they're not. Everybody's cooperating."

Skillman also addressed another issue at the site — missing the target date for the construction of the access bridge. The bridge was to have been constructed this year. However, the state Department of Environmental Protection was delayed in issuing the permit for doing so.

Skillman said once the drawings for the bridge culvert are approved, which could take six to eight weeks, the bridge can be installed, which will take about 45 days. He noted that it could take until the end of February 2009, but that he would like to see the bridge done as soon as possible because the workers are currently using a temporary access road to gain entry into the site, which has disturbed neighboring businesses.

Superintendent of Schools Dick Fitzpatrick also said there was a delay with the design of the fire suppression system. He said the delay did not come as a result of action or inaction by the school district or the school's water provider, Aqua New Jersey, of Hamilton. He said water flow tests taken at the site had an aberration, which resulted in the district having to follow through with retesting.

"The first flow test was lower than expected and the other one was much higher," Fitzpatrick said. "They wanted another test to validate the higher rate and the information was necessary to design the fire suppression system."

According to Fitzpatrick, the school district is already creating plans for the best transition to and use of the new school.

The district is also considering what to do with the spaces on the current campus that will be vacated once the new facility opens, such as the high school annex that has been used by lower-grade levels because of overcrowding at the elementary/ middle school.

The district has also started to analyze what equipment it will need to outfit the new school, he said.

"All of this has to be done, and it can't be done the day that the school opens," Fitzpatrick said. "When the school opens, it has to be flawless, and it will be flawless if we plan ahead."

Largely due to a presentation students gave the board last year regarding green initiatives, the school district has also been considering ways to save energy and natural resources, such as the use of solar panels, at the new school. In line with those discussions, board member Chris Shaw asked the superintendent to research waterless urinals for the bathrooms, which are reportedly capable of saving 45,000 gallons of water per year.