Spokane Public Schools says it's a big step closer to building a $14 million addition to the NewTech Skills Center in Hillyard, and the Central Valley School District separately expects to call for contractor bids this month to ready a tech branch campus on a site recently acquired in Spokane Valley's University City area.

The Spokane district learned recently that the state capital budget includes $1.8 million for site survey and design fees for the long-envisioned project that would expand the NewTech Skills Center, at 4141 N. Regal , says Greg Brown, the director of capital projects for the school district.

"We had been submitting requests to the state Legislature for the last three years and got approval this year," Brown says.

Bernardo Wills Architects PC, of Spokane, is designing the project. The district won't select a contractor until after it secures another $12.2 million for construction funding, Brown says.

The project still has several hoops to go through before it becomes a reality, he says. It would require approval by the state's school superintendent's office and the Office of Financial Management. It also would have to be included in the capital budget, which the Legislature will take up next spring.

The district has applied for construction money to be allocated in the 2013-2015 biennium, Brown says.

The two-story addition is planned on the south side of the current facility, which was constructed in 1982. The project would add 36,000 square feet of space to the 70,000-square-foot skills center, which provides high-school juniors and seniors with entry-level skills to qualify them to work in technical fields.

In the planned space, the district hopes to expand its health-services curriculum, which would include technical courses in the fields of dentistry, nursing, medical laboratory technology, and physical and occupational therapy, Brown says. The culinary arts program also likely would be expanded to include some of the new space, he says.

Other technical programs then would be able to use for classroom purposes some of the space the health services and culinary programs would vacate in the current building, Brown says.

As it is now, students in the automotive programs have to do most of their classroom work in the shop area.

Also, students don't have space to sit and eat lunch, he says.

Programs housed at the skills center include media production, computer programing and Web development, construction technology, criminal justice, veterinary assistance, and welding.

Brown says the planned addition would be the first of two expansion phases envisioned for the skills center. A second phase would involve remodeling the current facility and adding another 20,000 square feet of floor space.

"Phase II is planned for five years down the road," he says.

Meantime, the Central Valley School District plans to seek contractor bids this month to convert a 51,500-square-foot former Rite Aid store building at the southeast corner of University Road and Sprague Avenue into a planned NewTech Skills Center branch campus, to be called Spokane Valley Tech.

The district acquired the University City-area building in May for $1.8 million. It plans to remodel and equip the building at an estimated additional cost of up to $1.5 million, and it anticipates classes will begin there in January 2013, says Melanie Rose, district spokeswoman.

Architects West Inc., of Coeur d'Alene, designed the planned improvements.

The district says it's collaborating with East Valley, West Valley, and Freeman school districts to offer programs for career and college readiness beyond programs available at high schools or at the main NewTech Skills Center on Regal.

Spokane Valley Tech initially will offer aerospace and advanced manufacturing, cosmetology, and fire science programs beginning in September, although the programs will be held at other locations until the Spokane Valley Tech site opens, Rose says.

Commercial real estate agent Jim Koon, of Coeur d'Alene-based Century 21 Commercial Beutler & Associates, handled the real estate transaction involving the Spokane Valley Tech site.