The Massachusetts School Building Authority’s board of directors voted unanimously in favor of granting Lexington $118.8 million for its high school building project during its meeting Wednesday morning.
Lexington could get another $2.9 million from the MSBA if it uses some of its contingency funds on certain items the MSBA qualifies as reimbursable, Joe Pato, a member of the School Building Committee and Select Board, explained to the Observer.
The project team currently has about $124.3 million in contingencies factored into the $659.7 million estimated cost of the project. If Lexington gets that $2.9 million, the total the town could get from the MSBA is about $121.7 million.
“The project before you we’re excited about, it is the most cost effective of all the options that we took a look at. We’ve had over 230 community and building committee meetings, so lots of community engagement, which has been wonderful,” Lexington Public Schools Superintendent Julie Hackett told the MSBA’s board of directors during the meeting.
Lexington has been working with the MSBA to design the new high school so the town can get funding from the authority.
If the project ends up costing less than anticipated, the MSBA will likely reduce its grant accordingly. But if the project is more expensive, the grant will not increase.
Lexington’s ability to receive the MSBA’s grant is contingent on passing the town’s Dec. 8 Debt Exclusion vote, proving ownership of the land on which the school will be build through an Article 97 land swap (if it’s determined to be required), and fulfilling the Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act’s requirements, Karl Brown, an architect with the MSBA noted during the meeting.
Readers & Citizens,
The high school project is one that simply cannot be postponed any longer.
Most of us in Lexington are homeowners, so we know that when the roof is leaking and the 40 year old furnace stops working, we have to find a way to solve those issues. The current high school building is an antique on life support.
I see our choices with the high school as:
—build now for ~650M
—patch up old faithful for 250M, then in 10 years build for 1B+
Painful as it may be, we have an obligation as stewards to make wise choices in the interest of the greater good, so I believe the high school project as proposed is the most cost effective solution to the problem before us.
It’s Halloween today and the merchants are giving out free candy to the kiddies, we know that the merchants pay for the candy ( Thankyou)
And similarly the state has agreed to give us free “candy” too, in the form of a $118.8M grant!
But who pays for that? Well, every taxpayer in Massachusetts that’s who, including those who live in poor communities with inadequate municipal facilities including schools, working class residents of Massachusetts who can barely make ends meet.
In order to hand out this “candy” to Lexington, the state will have to get tax revenues from all communities in Massachusetts, rich and poor.
I wonder what the residents of Springfield, Holyoke, Fall River, North Adams, New Bedford, Lawrence, Worcester, Southbridge, Chelsea & Chicopee (the ten poorest communities in Massachusetts) feel about our grotesque “show” high school project? Is it fair for those less fortunate to pay for our haughty and misguided aspirations ?
If we as a town want to spend limitless money toward the satisfaction of our unquenchable egos, so be it, but how truly bourgeois it is to expect (and celebrate) the less fortunate paying for it, while they suffer.
Thank you for your comment. That is exactly why my Boston Globe op-ed opposing Bloom (https://drive.google.com/file/d/136cJxAYPztsy-5V5D2RrGC-la1g6tptd/view?usp=sharing) — because it is far too small and far too expensive per sq ft compared with similar new High Schools, while a more economical and flexible design has been ignored — ends with “Instead of helping an affluent town build an expensive, inadequate high school while less wealthy communities are in dire need of funds, the Massachusetts School Building Authority should send Lexington officials back to the drawing board.”
I am very tired of hearing our Town leaders say that Lexington should be more economically diverse, yet they support an overly expensive design when a nimbler one — a bunch of boxes — was eliminated under the false pretenses of “disruptions during construction” as if 11,000 residential taxpayers had to overpay in taxes for 30 or so years so 2,400 LHS kids don’t go through what our Hastings kids went through — and survived very well –, construction just 8 feet from their classrooms. Not everybody in Lexington wishes to always “fly 1st class” when coach is just fine. And it’s morally unhealthy for kids to believe that they can learn and study only in an architectural palace, rather than in a bunch of simple boxes.
Our Town leaders also claim they care, as I do, about the environment, yet the site where Bloom would be built would see its wetlands harmed.
I appreciate the opinions of Mr. Frank, Mr. Thenen, and Mr. Mehr, and I encourage them to continue to express their opinions in the Observer and other forums.
Of course, this particular discussion is now moot, since last night town meeting overwhelmingly passed Article 8 and Article 9.
Mr. Frank, as I said in my previous response, this discussion is becoming circular. Yes, we agree about the importance of careful stewardship of the town’s financial decisions. I think the difference of opinion comes in the fact that I believe this careful stewardship is already happening at all levels of town government. You believe that the town’s volunteer elected officials are liars.