Voters Torn on Addition or New School

Calling it a meeting designed to hear the ideas of Windham residents, the School Board hosted a facilities public hearing on Monday at Windham High School to discuss two ideas for overcrowding solutions.

Before gauging the temperature of the almost 50 people who showed up to the forum on the eve of the general election, School Board Chairman Bruce Anderson stressed that the meeting was not about political posturing nor was it a deliberative session.

Board member Mike Joanis delivered options of a phased addition on the current middle school and a new 7^th and 8^th grade facility as the two schemes that he and his fellow board members want to focus on.

Windham resident Alison Miller said she was in favor of building a new school, adding that she is concerned about the traffic and congestion on the driveways at the existing middle school site.

“I just hope that we can help the rest of the community to see how important it is, and how difficult it is to teach, for school to run,” she said.

Nancy Lafferty, who moved to town after the high school was built, called for the phased concept.

“I don’t feel it is the best interest of the children to be moving from school to school to school,” she said.

But Jennifer Colvin called the phased addition a “Band-Aid approach,” saying that she gets the same indication during discussions with her neighbors.

Joanis argued that the phased addition, which calls for a three-story portion to start that will cost $9.99 million, is hardly a Band-Aid.

“For me, it’s a little more than a Band-Aid, it’s a significant step in the right direction,” he said.

The new facility on London Bridge Road would be built near the high school and cost about $27.4 million.

Voters turned down architectural and engineering fees toward a new school in March, and Joanis said that there is no board proposal for any fees.

He said that while the board has not made a decision, he would expect that the full budgeted construction amount would be on the ballot.

Kevin Lefebvre looked a little ahead, saying that the $27.4 million will only grow in the future.

He added that if the town doesn’t make an investment in its schools, people will not move in to raise the value of the property taxes.

Roselyn Armstrong said that the cost tends to rise when projects are spread out over time, such as with a phased approach.

“I feel like it’s best to do it right the first time,” she said.

Armstrong called for an exit poll or show of hands of the residents in the audience, and people were asked to fill out a piece of paper with their preferred option so that the board can consider ideas for future discussions.

Another discussion brought forth by residents included the state of Golden Brook School, which more than one person said needs a lot of work.

The board acknowledged the needs at GBS, the oldest facility in town, even pulling up a diagram of a full build-out at the school designed by Lavallee Brensigner, an architectural firm that the district has been working with.

Work at GBS is part of the Facilities Master Plan. According to numbers presented by the board, to get the total classroom capacity district-wide up to 3,100 students, it will cost anywhere from $43 million to $48 million.

Depending on what is done by the district with either the phased approach or a new school, Golden Brook could face either a $7 million renovation or $14 million addition down the road.

Another part of the Facilities Master Plan includes the completion of athletic fields at the high school.

If a new middle school were built, Joanis said that there would also be room for three or four new fields on the other side of London Bridge Road.

The person in the audience most capable of speaking to the impact of school overcrowding in Windham may have been Michelle Saklad, who said she has a child at each of the town’s four facilities.

She reminded the board that voters want low tax impact, which was also the overwhelming sentiment delivered by residents in their responses to a recent community survey.

Saklad said that the School Board is not getting 60 percent of voters to agree with a phased addition.

“While that financial option (of a phased addition) seems better to me, I just feel that you’re not going to have the support you want with that particular option,” she said.

An administrative review of facility options also looked at the impact of a full addition without phases and doing nothing about the overcrowding at all. Negative impacts caused the board members to nix both ideas.

Anderson said that the board plans on keeping a better dialogue with the public, and will also deliver more information on the two options in future meetings.