New arts center on tap at Mueller

AUSTIN (KXAN) - The design plans for a $26.6 million Performing Arts Center will be approved by Austin Independent School District trustees at Monday night's school board meeting.

A 3-acre site for the complex, at the intersection of Mueller Boulevard and East 51st Street, was purchased by Austin ISD last April. That followed the hiring of Pfluger Associates Architects to design the PAC in 2009.

Funding for the project, which is still on budget, came out of the 2008 AISD bond issue. The programmed space in the building will include a 1,200-seat auditorium, a 225-seat black box theater, facility offices for the Fine Arts Department, plus a parking garage that contains 400 spaces for scheduled events.

An alternate bid to be considered by trustees included additional space for dance and rehearsal spaces, with moveable audience seating, according to backup materials presented to the school board.

The earliest stages of construction will begin on the site in June 2012. Construction should be completed, according to the school district, in the Fall of 2013.