This weeks announcement by the Massachusetts School Building Authority of a freeze on aid to school construction does not bode well for Burlington's plans to upgrade school facilities in town. http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2006/01/22/state_freezes_aid_on_school_construction/
Since the defeat by one vote of the kindergarten center proposal several years ago, the town has been unable to reach any consensus on how to go forward in addressing the continued aging of the school inventory. The Marshall Simonds Middle School helped us out in the decision making process by having it's boilers fail and forcing the issue, however little else has been accomplished.
The school facilities study committee has been hard at work trying to come up with three potential courses of action for the school committee to present to the town, so far only one seems to be the favorite among the committee members. That strategy would be to demolish the Memorial School and build a new elementary school in front of the existing building site on the Winn Street ball fields.
This proposal does not address other issues such as the aging of the middle school and the Pine Glen and Fox Hill Schools. Nor does it take into consideration what should should be done with the old Wildwood School. The issue of whether or not it makes sense to take back the Meadowbrook does not seem to be on anybody's radar screen.
If you then add in the High School that is nearing 40 years old it is conceivable that the town could be faced with upwards of 80 million dollars in construction and renovation costs over the next decade or so.
Under normal circumstances the town could look to the state to absorb over 50% of the construction costs in payments beginning a couple of years after the approvals, bonding and construction began. All of this has been thrown into confusion by the events that have taken place over the past year or two.
On July 28, 2004, legislation was signed creating the Massachusetts School Building Authority as a new independent public authority. The effect of this was to transfer control of the School Building Assistance Program from the Department of Education to the Massachusetts School Building Authority. It is a new and independent governing body comprised of seven members of which the State Treasurer serves as Chairman. http://www.mass.gov/msba/index.htm
The passing of this legislation recognized that the state sponsored building program had gotten out of control and resulted in nearly ten billion dollars worth of school projects through out the state that were basically unfunded. The reform legislation put the program under the direction of the state treasurer and provided for a 1 cent portion of the state sales tax as a method to fund the program going forward.
Even with with these reforms the program has still been unmanageable because of a variety of factors that are out of the control of state and municipal officials and some that are easily controlled. Steel, concrete and petroleum costs are all significantly up. In addition you have the usual over runs because of design or site problems. Couple this with the prevailing wage act, which guarantees that the labor on any project will be the highest possible cost and you can see how a school project can become a white elephant.
One way for the state and the tax payers to draw the line on the cost of these projects is to reduce the enormous front end costs of the design of a school. Schools are not works of art. They are a utilitarian structure solely for the purpose of providing education. There is no reason that an elementary school should take on unique architectural and design difference from one community to another with one exception and that is site peculiarities.
The state should fund a design contest for three categories of buildings. Out of that competition should come three winners in each category, three high schools, three middle schools and three elementary schools. If a community wants state reimbursement for a school project then they would be limited to selecting one of the prepackaged designs already bought and paid for by the state.
This would not rein in run away construction costs however it would go a long way toward reducing the front end costs of re-inventing the wheel each time a community needs a building. Construction efficiencies would result simply from the repititon of constructiong the same type buildings. This of course would be bitterly opposed by the lobbyists who represent the architects.
Another way that could be examined but would also likely be opposed by special interests groups would be the conversion of existing office space into classrooms. Many communities in the commonwealth have an abundance of vacant office space that could be converted and rented at a substantial savings over what new construction would costs be.
Some significant changes have to be made because the current method is simply not sustainable.
