The Select Board plans to ask Southborough voters to approve funding 1-3 Feasibility Studies for a school renovation or addition, plus urgently needed work on the Neary School roof.
The ask will be presented at a Special Town Meeting, tentatively scheduled for Saturday, March 7th. If the expense is high enough, Town election voters may also need to approve a ballot measure in May.
At a joint meeting of several committees on Monday night, officials honed in on the plan. More details, including estimated cost of studies and the wording of Articles, will be dealt with at the board’s next meeting this Tuesday, December 16th.
Voters would be given the choice to fund 1-3 Feasibility Studies to vet project viability and cost. The study/studies would provide voters data to later decide which building project to fund designing and constructing.
The Select Board plans to give voters the option to study: renovating Neary School, a Finn School addition to add two more grades, and/or smaller additions at Finn School and Trottier Middle School to add one grade to each.
Each of the options was supported as educationally viable by the School Committee in votes this past summer (after the proposal to build a new four grade Neary School was rejected by voters). But each also comes with a unique set of complicating factors raised in Monday’s meeting and/or prior public discussions.
I’ll describe the project details and complications further down. But, to make it easier for readers, I put together a table right that summarizes the options. (You can open a pdf version here.)
The table also clarifies how the options were labeled in the report, matrix and other data compiled and shared by the PreK-8 School Building Committee earlier this fall. You can find those documents here.
The board still hasn’t agreed on how many Articles to present. Member Tim Fling recommended bundling the studies in one Article, followed by three individual Articles that voters could pass if the first failed. Members Al Hamilton and Kathy Cook believed they should just be proposed separately. Either way, they are likely to ask the Moderator (and the hall) to allow discussing all of the proposals at once.
A final Article would ask voters to fund a project for Neary School’s roof. And those details are also still uncertain.
The School Committee is waiting to hear back from their expert in January on the roof replacement cost. Based on earlier reports, they are worried the cost could be $4-6M. That would a big ask for a building that voters are still unsure will remain a school in the long term.
They are asking to learn if there is a shorter term, less expensive solution than a full roof replacement. But based on prior reports, they are skeptical that will be possible.
The Select Board’s decision near the end of Monday’s meeting was unanimous. But other participating committees didn’t vote. And there were some differing opinions expressed during a long discussion with debates and public comments prior to the vote.
Uncertainty over Special Town Meeting Schedule
During the discussion, Select Board Chair Andrew Dennington sought feedback, especially from public commenters, about whether a Saturday or weeknight is better for holding the Town Meeting. The response continued to be mixed. But some officials were concerned that the unusual ask for voters will lead to long discussion and debate, stretching on too long for an evening meeting.
Commenter Mary Tinti agreed. She stressed that most community members aren’t “dialed in”. Even if the Town holds public forums in advance, she believes many will wait until the meeting to make comments and try to get clarity.
There was discussion of potentially moving the meeting up earlier in the year to January or February if the roof needs to be dealt with sooner. But Cook worried that winter weather is too iffy. Dennington also worried that it would be difficult to do enough advance out reach to educate voters in time for a January meeting.
Possible Need for Proposition 2½ Ballot Measure
And Advisory Committee member Andrew Pfaff highlighted that holding the STM sooner might not expedite their ability to spend funds. If the cost of the roof (or the studies) is high enough, the STM votes may be contingent on a ballot measure would need to wait for the Annual Town Election in May.
The Advisory Committee member was referring to his comment earlier in the meeting about a potential proposition 2½ debt exclusion or override ballot measure.1
For the “New Neary Project”, officials had pursued a debt exclusion. It’s worth noting that Pfaff said that the Town is “most likely needing an override anyway”. That’s consistent with Advisory’s warning to voters last spring that that the Town would need an override next year just to cover the overall budgets and expenses for FY27, regardless of any school project. And during a Select Board’s discussion last month, Hamilton warned his board that if they didn’t do something to reign in the Town budgets, “the voters are going to do something for us as we look at 2½ overrides.”
Neary Roof Urgency & Complication
Some officials, parents, and community members were anxious about the dire situation with the Neary School roof. In meetings earlier this year, the committee had discussed the worry that the roof could “blow off” next year if not replaced this summer. In this week’s meeting, additional concerns were shared about the situation students are already dealing with this year.
School Committee Chair Chelsea Malinowski told the Select Board that it needs to be addressed as soon as possible:
to have our children having to go throughout the day smelling wet insulation and whatever else is coming through is just unacceptable at this point.
Capital Improvement and Planning Committee (CIPC) Chair Jason Malinowski told the group that as of last week:
We have parents considering sending their kids to school with umbrellas because we had yellow coming through the roof.
The cost of replacing a roof could potentially trigger the need for the Town to bring the building up to code. That work would require expensive renovations to meet ADA standards, add a fire suppression system, etc.
Some, like commenter Rebecca Dente, worried that voters would use the investment in the roof as an excuse to not fund a school building project, and just continue to kick the can down the road on needed improvements or school building solutions.
Alternatively some worried that voters might reject a request to fund an expensive project on a school that might not remain one for the next 30 years. Commenter Laura Vaughan pressed officials to tell the public what the alternative plan would be if Town Meeting rejects paying for a new roof.
Earlier, Chelsea Malinowski made clear that in her opinion there isn’t a viable alternative. (She indicated that she believes that is the School Committee’s unofficial consensus.) She opposed putting kids into modular classrooms next year while the town figures out next steps.
She had supported the New Neary Project asking students and teachers to make educational and experience sacrifices for two years to allow the community to improve the situation with the schools. But she opposed putting kids through that “for we don’t know how long if we don’t have a plan.” But she acknowledged that if the roof failed, the committee wouldn’t have a choice.
Tinti, who has a child headed to Neary next year told the board that the discussions that have them going in circles is “exhausting” and “dejecting to every parent” as they have no idea what the situation is going to be for their kids next year. She supported the plan to bring voters the options that they asked for.
Commenter Tim Litt objected to officials treating ADA and Code work as “zombies” to be avoided rather than important, needed improvements. But it was those big expenses foreseen years ago that initially prompted officials to look at whether it was possible to consolidate Southborough schools (from four buildings to three).
That work ultimately led to the New Neary Project, which voters rejected, leaving officials with no consensus on how to deal with the Neary building.
Potential Projects & Their Complications
Pfaff argued that the Town should reinvestigate purchasing a new parcel of land to build a new school. He pointed to the complications that each current building site comes with as reason that a project could work better elsewhere. Advisory member Howard Rose argued that he believed that would be more expensive than renovating a school.
That point was debated by Cook who, like Pfaff, served on the former Neary Building Committee’s Financial Subcommittee. Based on what they learned, they believed building new is less expensive.
Rose argued that depended on how much was being put into a renovation. He believed the smaller renovation projects included in the options would be less expensive.
The projects that the Select Board voted to present to voters are below (with my explainer on complications).
Full renovation of Neary School (Option E)
(renovation on current foundation, includes ADA upgrades, sprinkler system, etc.)
Keeps current grade alignments: Finn PreK-1, Woodward 2-3, Neary 4-5, and Trottier 6-8
Complications:
- During debates over the New Neary Project, some residents have expressed concerns about the site being downhill from former landfill. (Cook noted that she spoke to people who said they would have supported that project if it was at a different site. She doesn’t know how many voters that represents.)
- Renovation costs need to include dealing with asbestos.
- Based on what the former Neary Building Committee learned from their consultants, some officials worry that a major renovation would be more expensive than building a new school.
- Requires continuing to pay for excess building capacity and expenses related to running four schools.
Finn School Expansion (Option D)
(Adding two grades)
Finn PreK-3, Woodward 4-5, Trottier 6-8; Neary closed as a school
Complications:
- A “parkland” Conservation Restriction on recreational area of Finn campus could be too restrictive to allow the build out. Based on prior advice from Town Counsel, Jason Malinowski told the Select Board that their board needs to determine if they can resolve that through a “legislative” solution.
- Voters may not be willing to fund the Neary Roof project and fund a project that closes Neary as a school
- Costs of fixing Neary to work as a municipal building for the Town are unknown.
Small additions to Finn School & Trottier Middle School (Option B2)
(Adding 1 grade at each)
Finn PreK-2, Woodward 3-4, and Trottier 5-8; Neary closed as a school
Complications:
- Issues with Trottier’s septic capacity limits and perk issues, and conservation/environmental issues (due to a perennial stream and wetland). Plus, some have voiced concerns that it may be inappropriate to have 5th graders at the middle school.
- Voters may not be willing to fund the Neary Roof project and fund a project that closes Neary as a school
- Costs of fixing Neary to work as a municipal building for the Town are unknown.
- Proposition 2½ is the state’s limit on how much a city/town can increase the levy (total overall real & personal property tax imposed on voters) each year. Once taxes from “new growth” are deducted, the increased levy can’t exceed a 2.5% over the prior year. But there are exceptions, which include payments on borrowing that voters have previously voted to exclude from debt. An override allows the Town to raise the levy limit & ceiling for the year (setting a new level that the next year’s calculation is based off of), and isn’t isolated to a specific expense. You can learn more about Prop 2½ here.
