Driving past the Tracy High campus as I do most every day, I’ve seen the work under way on two new buildings on the Tracy High campus from a distance, but I hadn’t been able take a close-up look — until earlier this week.

That’s when I made a walk-through of the projects along with Tracy Unified Superintendent Jim Franco, business chief Casey Goodall, new-facilities director Bonny Carter and construction manager Tom Crites.

From what I saw and heard on the tour, work on the two new buildings is on schedule, and one of the new structures — the single-story cafeteria-music building — will be opened sometime in October.

Opening the two-story library-classroom building next door will follow in January.

Work on outdoor projects, including landscaping and removing some, but not all, of the portable classrooms, will continue into next spring, said Crites, who is with RGM & Associates construction-management firm.

Crites was also construction manager for the new classroom-administration building that, beginning in January 2009, has replaced the original Tracy High “West Building.”

“The new buildings now being completed will complement the replacement for the West Building in exterior design, but they won’t have quite as much Mission Revival elements,” he said.

Like the West Building replacement, the new buildings are tilt-up concrete structures. Their basic elements:

• The single-story 31,000-square-foot cafeteria-music building will include an 8,200-square-foot cafeteria with a food court and snack stand. Seating will be indoors and outside under in an area protected by a permanent cover. A F.E.A.S.T. (Food Education and Service Technology) kitchen-dining area will adjoin rooms for home-economics and child-development. The Joe E. Foster Music Center will have a band room, choir room, practice rooms, music library and offices.

• The two-story, 48,000-square-foot library-classroom building will be anchored on the ground floor by a 4,700-square-foot library with a towering ceiling. A total of 18 classrooms, most on the second floor, will include special business-education rooms with expanded computer capacities and a conference center.

In addition to the two main buildings in the works to replace demolished 1950s-era classroom wings, this phase of the Tracy High reconstruction project was kicked off last year by remodeling the original Hawley-Westlake math-and-science building into a specially equipped science center.

That was followed by refurbishing the industrial arts and the auto mechanics buildings. Those jobs have been completed.

Most of the money to finance this phase of the Tracy High restoration project — the two new buildings and remodeling of existing buildings — have included $32.5 million in local Measure E funds from the successful $51 million bond issue approved by Tracy Unified School District voters in 2006 and $26.9 million in state matching funds, for a total project cost of $59.4 million

Other Measure E funds, also augmented by state bond money, went for the West Building replacement on the Tracy High campus and, at West High, the football stadium and 50-meter swimming pool. A black-box theater is still to be completed at West High.

Franco said the timing of the district embarking on these school-construction projects couldn’t have been better.

“I can’t underscore how important it was to pass Measure E in 2006,” said Franco. “In today’s economic climate, the chances of getting voter approval are a lot less than they were four years ago.”

No one can argue with that.

• Sam Matthews, Tracy Press publisher emeritus, can be reached at 830-4234 or by e-mail at shm@tracypress.com.