STAFF WRITER CONNIE SWINNEY

H-E-B employees will begin temporarily parking on a newly constructed lot on the Marble Falls Middle School property at the intersection of Pony Circle and Bluebonnet Drive until the new grocery store is completed in the summer of 2018. Staff photo by Connie Swinney

MARBLE FALLS — Crews are clearing the way for a lot on the Marble Falls Middle School property as part of an agreement between the school district and H-E-B for temporary employee parking while the new store is being built.

The private-public partnership involves H-E-B funding the lot construction, paying the district an additional $23,000, and eventually repurposing the lot after the adjacent store opens, potentially next summer.

The 75,000-square-foot parking lot — at the intersection of Pony Circle and Bluebonnet Drive — will be for H-E-B employees only.

Officials said they struck the deal at “no cost to the district.”

“We’ve given them what’s called a surface lease,” Marble Falls Independent School District Superintendent Chris Allen said. “Once they’re done with it, it will be returned back to its original state or a portion of it paved for parking, and as part of the agreement, H-E-B will be funding additional beautification or improvement of that area.

“There is a chance we pave some portion of it for parking,” Allen added. “Some of that we will determine based on input from stakeholders.”

A number of store employees typically use on-site parking at the existing store, 1503 RR 1431, as well as a parking lot adjacent to First United Methodist Church, 1101 Bluebonnet Drive.

The school district said H-E-B officials will make monthly payments on the agreement, after which, the district will decide how to allocate the funding.

connie@thepicayune.com