The Brinnon School District received an almost $3 million grant that Superintendent Trish Beathard said will be used to modernize its facility.

The money, from the state’s Office of Superintendent of Public Education, will be used to put a new roof on the school building, rework the electrical system, and remove and replace old flooring that contains asbestos, she said.

Beathard stated that a generator to provide electricity during frequent outages will also be part of the upgrades.

She said the work will probably be done next summer when students are not in school.

The superintendent noted that grant funds recently made other major improvements possible.

“The whole front of the building was reinforced and made more energy efficient,” she noted. “We have new doors across the front of the building and also new main entry doors, and all of that was grant funded as well. And they’re ADA accessible doors. So, we’ve done a lot of work with facilities grants.”

“What's really significant is we don't want to go to our taxpayers and ask them for money for things that we think we might be able to get grant funding for,” Beathard added.

“We're really trying to be respectful of our taxpayers. I think it means a lot to our community financially. We would be in kind of a rough financial position if we had to come up with the money to replace the roof. And we're babying along these asbestos floors that need attention. I think that it's going to mean a nicer work area and a nicer learning area for our teachers and our kids and our staff.”