Navy Expert to Head School Building Program

The Los Angeles Unified School District on Wednesday named a Navy construction expert to head its school building program.

Capt. James McConnell, who runs a construction center at the Navy base in Port Hueneme, has signed a three-year contract with the school district. He will earn $190,000 a year.

McConnell faces the daunting task of building 85 schools in the next five years. He will face numerous obstacles, including a dearth of available land and potential sites tainted by industrial waste.

McConnell, 47, who is retiring from the Navy, said he is up to the task as the district’s new chief facilities executive.

“For 25 years I’ve been in the business of construction, operations and maintenance,” he said. “I’ve even built a couple of schools.”

But McConnell also acknowledged the magnitude of the task.

“I don’t know if we’ll get 85 schools built in five years, but that will be our goal,” he said. “If we do, it will be a major contribution to this community.”

McConnell has held a series of military construction posts over the last two decades.

He managed Navy programs in the early 1990s that built and maintained facilities in England and Europe. After that, he led a mobile construction battalion in Gulfport, Miss., that provided engineering and construction services to Navy bases around the world.

McConnell also managed a program in the late 1990s that built two Navy bases in southern Italy. One of the sites included an elementary school and a high school.

At the base in Port Hueneme, McConnell serves as commanding officer of the Construction Battalion Center, which equips and prepares Navy construction units for missions around the globe.

McConnell replaces Robert Buxbaum, the district’s interim general manager of facilities. Aside from building schools, he will oversee the maintenance and operations of facilities. McConnell is scheduled to join the district April 1.