WARM SPRINGS, Ga. — Within view of a large bust of the late President Franklin D. Roosevelt, construction has begun on The Roosevelt School at Warm Springs, a $20 million residential and vocational services facility to serve students at Roosevelt Warm Springs Institute for Rehabilitation.
Groundbreaking for the Meriwether County facility, which will have more than 150 beds, drew 250-300 people Thursday to the town where FDR established a world-renowned polio treatment facility in the late 1920s.
Speaking at the groundbreaking, Georgia Department of Labor Commissioner Michael Thurmond, a Democrat, said when he went to Republican Gov. Sonny Purdue to seek his support for a new facility to replace the aging five-story vocational rehabilitation building, both men realized this project should transcend politics.
The state provided about $9.9 million, and the federal government the remainder, for a 70,000-square-foot, two-story, U-shaped building to be located down Oak Street from Georgia Hall. Batson-Cook Construction of West Point, the same company that built Georgia Hall just before the Great Depression, was awarded the contract to build the new facility.
Thurmond called this project the single-most-important project he has ever been involved in, saying it should help ensure Roosevelt Institute is here serving Georgians for another 82 years.
The commissioner said he and Purdue were “two Georgians concerned about improving the quality of service” at “a unique place where all barriers come down.”
“This day, this building, this morning is the epitome of my accomplishments. Nothing I ever do will equal this great moment,” Thurmond said.
“It’s going to become a showplace for our campus and a tremendous improvement over our current facilities,” said Roosevelt Institute Executive Director Greg Schmieg. “When I first came on board, Commissioner Thurmond challenged me to bring Roosevelt Warm Springs into the 21st Century and the Roosevelt School will become a major part of that success.”
The facility, featuring the latest equipment available, also will include three classrooms for training and other purposes — enhancing the potential for evening programs — common areas such as a library, coffee shop, a large vending area and meeting space for campus groups.
It will serve people from across Georgia and even from outside the state in need of vocational rehabilitation services.
William A. Tomlin, who spent 34 1/2 years with the institute, said unlike some schools which give students a specific time to complete programs, Roosevelt Institute allows students with disabilities who have to drop out of vocational rehabilitation courses for health reasons to complete vocational studies later.
The emphasis, he said, is on completing a certain number of hours.
Warm Springs Mayor Hazel Ramsey said she hopes things continue to progress at Roosevelt Institute, and that a program getting off the ground to serve wounded U.S. Army veterans in Warm Springs by working with Fort Benning will increase.
“This project will employ more people here and help the city of Warm Springs,” said the mayor, whose family lived in the Godwin House on campus while she was growing up.
Michael Wooten of Douglas, Ga., a business education student since Feb. 9, said the rehabilitation programs have helped him tremendously.
“I couldn’t shift or turn myself when I came in,” he said. “Now I’m doing a lot for myself. I love it so much I would like to stay, but it’s time for me to leave Dec. 17. I hope to go back to school and try to go back to work. This new facility will mean a great deal to students.”
The building, which lies at one end of the campus Quadrangle, is expected to be completed by December 2010. Officials said they have not decided what to do with the old vocational rehab building.
The next major improvement may be rehabilitating 14 historic cottages that are part of the Warm Springs National Historic Landmark District. An application has been turned in for an America’s Treasures grant for a renovation project expected to cost $2.9 million.
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