Five town boards met together Monday night to consider whether building a new school on the site of the Tisbury School is the best option, and after nearly two hours of discussion, decided to do nothing and move forward with that plan.
The building committee had already voted 11-5 on the plan, but hit the pause button after significant pushback from the public and the town’s planning board on the idea that the 79-year-old brick school building will be knocked to the ground.
At Monday’s meeting in a packed Tisbury School library, there was a mix of people who supported the building committee’s decision and a contingent who wanted the building preserved for historic and nostalgic reasons.
Melissa Ogden, a special education teacher at Tisbury School, said the disruption to students not having a gymnasium or other facilities during a renovation project would be too much.
“I don’t want my son educated in a trailer,” added parent Richard Brew, referring to a need to house students in modular classrooms if the renovation plan was chosen. “I’d like him educated in a new school.”
Jane Taylor, a teacher at the school who lived through a previous renovation, said the committee shouldn’t underestimate the impact on education. “It was a challenging time to be a student in this building,” she said.
But for every parent and teacher who talked about the need for an energy-efficient building with 21st century spaces for education, there were people bemoaning the loss of a community institution to a wrecking ball.
“I don’t think it’s purely nostalgia when someone wants to restore a historic building that has nice design features to it,” Kate Scott told the committees.
Henry Stephenson echoed the sentiments of many when he said keeping the old school building where it is would be a temporary disruption for the long-term good. “This is a really good design for a building that’s located where it ought to be,” he said of the 1938 building.
“It’s hard to stomach you would throw away something that represents history of the town,” planning board chairman Ben Robinson said.
There was no vote by the building committee after it became clear that none of the members would change their minds. Three committee members participated in the meeting remotely, and town administrator Jay Grande, who is on vacation, submitted a letter saying he could support either plan moving forward.
Any school project still faces the hurdle of price. The new school is expected to cost taxpayers $32.3 million, while the architect and project manager say a renovation and addition to the existing building would cost local taxpayers $3 million more. The plan for a new school is in the hands of the Massachusetts School Building Authority, which is considering whether to reimburse the town for part of the project’s costs.
Eventually, the project will require a Proposition 2½ debt exclusion, and as it stands now, that would add $800 per year to a house valued at $800,000, town officials have said.
Town leaders repeatedly urged the building committee and Tisbury School Committee to find areas to cut that number.
“I want to do what’s going to pass at the ballot at this point. We don’t want to go through all this work and see it fail,” selectman Tristan Israel said. “We’ve got to get the price down.”
Harold Chapdelaine, who is a member of the William Street Historic District, asked the committee to consider the new school in the context of other town needs, like a new police station and town hall. “The burdens of taxation that are coming down the line could prove debilitating to many,” he said.
Mr. Chapdelaine said his committee would look at the demolition, calling it “brutally irresponsible.”
Peter Turowski, architect for the school project, said the Massachusetts Historical Commission has already been consulted, and found no historic value to the structure.
The renovation and addition would be more expensive, he said because the building must be brought up to code, and the MSBA does not reimburse for portable classrooms.
Selectmen chairman Larry Gomez said it’s time to get behind the project as a town: “I hope people don’t go to the polls to vote no because they didn’t get what they want,” he said.
Will not be voting for this. Our household is still reeling from the tax hike due to the new emergency services building, which I did vote for. Remember all the headaches with that construction? How about all the ongoing problems with the construction of new schools in West Tisbury and Chilmark? New isn’t always best. The architecture of the proposed school is very unappealing, and the siting stinks. This is not the best plan on many fronts. This isn’t nostalgia. Propose a better plan at a better price.
Ok, the budget analysis is by the architect company that designed it?! Not even bidding contractors? That makes little sense. Please have an independent budget analysis. Let’s really understand whether renovating will be more than build and tear down. I doubt it. Of course the architects want the new building. And as far as taxes — please remember non resident property owners can’t vote, yet pay a third more than year round residents. And of course they have no children in the schools. So – how fair is adding more tax burden unequally? If this tax hike goes through please re-examine – taxation without representation. But better yet – save the original school building and change the siting so an addition can be added around it.
Comments are closed.