Column: Meeting on Wellesley school buildings renovations set for Sept. 23

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The Board of Selectmen (BOS) and School Committee (SC) are considering a proposal to Special Town Meeting in December that would support the long-term renovation/replacement facilities master plan for our school buildings. The capital projects to be proposed at Special Town Meeting would be the start of a multiple-year program for the upgrade of our school facilities. The proposals to be considered this year would include design funds for renovations at Fiske and Schofield to address building system and minor programmatic needs, study money to support further evaluation of options at Hardy, Hunnewell and Upham as well as engineering assessment funds for future HVAC and plumbing projects at the middle school. The School Facilities Committee made an initial presentation to the boards at a joint meeting of the BOS and SC on Aug. 27 (available on-demand at http://www.wellesleymedia.org) and further discussion of the topic is planned for a joint BOS/SC meeting on Sept. 23 at 7:15 pm in the Juliani Room at Town Hall.

The School Facilities Committee spent the summer reviewing existing enrollment reports, modeling classroom needs for the next seven years, reviewing various options including redistricting, reconfiguration of grades in each school as well as redistricting or reconfiguration with major building renovations or additions. Currently we are over classroom capacity in some schools, and we have inequity in class size and program delivery. Redistricting or reconfiguration could improve educational program equity, however even with redistricting or reconfiguration, the forecast indicates the need to use all seven elementary schools over the next seven years.

Also as part of the review, the Committee received an update on the Strategic Plan and the potential program changes to be recommended for the school year starting in September, 2014. Those potential program additions and/or changes would not require any extra dedicated or special spaces. Redistricting or reconfiguration also does not require a change in the existing facilities structure.

Lastly, the Committee built upon the work of last year's School Facilities Master Plan (SFMP) committee. The SFMP reviewed the type and cost of building systems work recommended in the 2013 Symmes Maini & McKee Associations study and began the process of prioritizing projects for future consideration..

With the enrollment forecast, the Strategic Plan recommendations and the work of the SFMP as background, the School Facilities Committee is making the following recommendations:

-- Hardy, Hunnewell and Upham should be candidates for potential major renovations, additions, replacement and/or consolidation and should be submitted to the Massachusetts School Building Authority during the next Statement of Interest cycle. In the interim, a study should be commenced to identify "what if" scenarios of several possible options to be considered given enrollment changes, programmatic changes and renovations, replacements or consolidations for these schools,

-- Fiske and Schofield have well-defined building systems renovations needs that should be addressed today; they are similar in project scope, which could provide cost and timing efficiencies and the work could be completed over two summers,

--Given the recent construction of Bates, Sprague and P.A.W.S., their needs should be primarily addressed through the annual budget's cash capital cycle.

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Column: Meeting on Wellesley school buildings renovations set for Sept. 23