Construction in full swing at Seton campus

By Andrew Junker, The Catholic Sun,
April 19, 2007

CHANDLER — Seton Catholic High School is beginning to see the fruits of its years-long capital campaign. Last month they began construction on a chapel, the first structure to be built in what will eventually be an entirely new campus.

“We started the capital campaign about six years ago and raised $6 million,” said Paula Osterday, Seton’s director of development.

“With that money we were able to purchase additional land, move our football field and start building the St. Elizabeth Ann Seton Chapel,” she said.

Osterday hopes the chapel will be completed by September, but said it will be operational by December at the latest.

Building the chapel before any other planned facilities sends a message, she said.

“There was a real emphasis that we needed to build the chapel so that it could be the center of our school, to communicate that message that we are a Catholic educational institution,” she said. “Faith is the foundation of everything else we do.”

The school has organized a committee of teachers and parents to decide how to furnish the chapel once it is built. They hope to capture the spirit of the saint who is lending the chapel her name.

Osterday said that one faculty member traveled to Pennsylvania where St. Elizabeth Ann Seton is buried and took photos of the chapel where she prayed.

“We’re going to try to make everything in the chapel a reflection of her faith and the things that she liked,” Osterday said.

From concept to completion

While construction crews tackle preliminary issues on the building’s site like grading, drainage and laying the groundwork for utilities, their role is just one of many in the complicated world of capital campaigns.

John Minieri, director of Buildings and Properties for the diocese, described the process.

His department meets with the parish or school and discusses the general plans they have for constructing new buildings. Then he puts together a short list of architects who could be a good match for what the parish or school hopes to achieve.

In a series of interviews, the school or parish finds the architect who’s right for them.

“We’ve seen the chemistry between the architects and the parishes and schools is really what’s important,” Minieri said, adding that the whole process is repeated to find the right construction managers.

Finally, his office hires an independent manager to work closely with the construction team and keep both the parish or school and his office up-to-date.

He said bringing in outside help is necessary in a diocese that is expanding so quickly. There are currently 20 building projects in the diocese at some stage of development, each of which has an estimated cost of at least $1 million.

Keeping everything straight in the development world is often tied into the funding and, perhaps more importantly, the sequencing of funding, Minieri said.

For example, completing the chapel at Seton is the first of five phases of construction for the school. When all phases are complete, the school will have an entirely new campus adjacent to the old one.

As construction moves ahead for the first phase, Osterday said a new capital campaign committee has already begun raising funds for the subsequent phases.

The fundraising is going well, she said, in large part due to the satisfaction potential donors feel at seeing the chapel go up.

“It’s generated a lot of excitement,” she said. “There are a lot of people in the community who are very happy to see this happening because they see the school as a real contribution to the community.”