Selma School officials will turn the dirt soon to start the construction of a new high school.

School board members agreed Tuesday night during a work session they would meet Dec. 18 at noon in front of the present high school building for the ceremony.

“We’ll get the shovels and the hard hats, then,” said school board President Henry Hicks Sr.

Equipment is expected to move on site within the next couple of weeks and construction to begin.

Already the school system has drawn the first of its grant money to pay $525,000 worth of bills accrued during the early stages of the construction.

“We have those bills to pay today,” school superintendent Don Jefferson said.

The construction comes a couple of years after Volkert & Associates Inc. of Mobile, the architects for the job, performed an assessment of Selma High School.

At that time, the engineering firm estimated renovations of the high school would cost about $20 million. Construction of a new high school would cost between $38-40 million.

But the school system is getting the 157,000-square-foot project completed for about $27 million and the greater part of that is a grant the school system will pay back with no interest.

“All we’re waiting on right now is for the governor to sign off on the paperwork,” Jefferson said.

Plans call for construction of a new main building and renovation of technical buildings behind them.

The main building was construction in 1939. Other buildings on the campus were constructed over time.