Work continues to progress on the upper story apartment of the Prairie Lakes Area Education Agency (AEA) building in downtown Jefferson.

Greene County High School Industrial Technology Teacher Kirk Davis is in his first year and says the experience of picking up the project that was started last school year has been great. Through his discussions with Prairie Lakes AEA Chief Administrator Jeff Herzberg, Davis says the original designs have been slightly altered, including removing the existing eight-foot walls.

“He really liked the open floor plan, using the skylights, having some of that open quality. We kind of piece together part of what was planned out. Then we gave it just a little more open feel and a little cleaner feel to keep it user-friendly but still that open quality.”

Davis adds that some of the walls are as high as 15-feet and slope back toward the south end of the building, which means the wall frames had to be individually cut to fit the slope. Other plans include an L-shaped kitchen from the entry stairs, which flows into a dining room/living room area. The master bedroom overlooks the downtown area. There will also be a full bathroom and a second bedroom.

Currently, Davis says they are waiting on the subcontractors to finish their work before the construction class students can get to hanging sheetrock and do other tasks to finish off the apartment. To hear more from Davis on the project, listen to today’s Community State Bank in Paton Let’s Talk Greene County program.