Mr. Winikur explained that Templeton was one of
the first districts selected into the eligibility phase in 2007.
“The existing Center Elementary School was
grandfathered because of age (built in 1941),” Mr. Winikur said. “MSBA spent a
lot of time there and deemed it unsuitable. All engineering systems are in need
of replacement.”
And the existing Baldwinville Elementary School is
even older, built in 1925.
“There’s no library in either school,” Mr.
Poinelli said. “The acoustics in the gym are outrageously bad. The plumbing
system is well beyond its use.
With the existing educational configuration, there
are four schools. Prekindergarten attends school in Phillipston; grades
kindergarten and 1 go to Templeton Center; grades 2 to 4 are at Baldwinville
Elementary School and the 5th grade goes to the middle school.
But if the new educational configuration goes
through, it will be consolidated into one pre-K to grade 5 elementary school.
Special education students will also have
integrated teaching spaces and special teaching areas. There will be a library
and a gym, state-of-the art music and art rooms, an elevator, and
handicapped-accessible bathrooms, which the current schools don’t have. There
will be LED lighting, wireless access throughout the building and grounds,
video surveillance, an intrusion detection system and a cafetorium. There will
also be a lobby with a seating area, as well as a physical and occupational
therapy room.
“We feel we have an overall good contemporary
floor plan to bring the kids together,” Mr. Poinelli said.
To pay for the school, Templeton would require a
Proposition 2 1/2 debt exclusion tax override, which would need two approvals,
both at the Nov. 9 Town Meeting and the Dec. 8 ballot vote, to pass.
Detail design work would be done from January to
October 2016. Construction would last from October to June 2018. It would be a
93,000-square-foot school that would serve 580 students.
Clarification on this one school consolidation configuration please.
posted by Jeff Bennett
Sunday, October 9, 2016
On October 20, 2016, people get a second chance to vote for, or not, for a new school. Of particular interest to me is what is the best guess cost to the taxpayer going to be. Consider that now, not in the future, $1.00 per thousand will raise $597,000.00. That is based on recent information from the Assessors office in Templeton. That bears checking out on your part.
Now, what follows is from a letter to editor in the Gardner news around this time last year, 2015:
The Templeton Center site has been approved by architects, engineers and the Massachusetts School Building Authority. A few have said that we need a new school but is too costly. The cost to Templeton resulting from state reimbursement is 24.8 million. The annual residential tax is $1.74 per 1,000 home valuation.
From information at Town meeting on November 9, 2015 and from other meetings, as well as a debt calculator on the website of MA DLS, 24 million dollars for 28 years at 3.5% would mean a yearly payback of about 1.4 million dollars.
If we take the information from the Assessors office and compare it to the information given at the Town Meeting, I do not see anyway for $1.74 to work, not close. Consider that back in 2015, I believe the information available was $1.00 per thousand would raise $556,000.00. Again, $1.74 per thousand does not work. So why is that? Is that some new math? Using the information from the Assessors office, $2.00 per thousand would raise almost 1.2 million dollars, but we have to have 1.4 million per year, so again, where did this $1.74 come from? Time to get honest, time to be conservative, time to be real, pick one, just be honest and tell people that it is not going to be $1,74, it will be $2.34 per thousand or $2.50 per thousand.
By the way, just for informational purposes, on those documents available, the $1.74 per thousand had the words "net increase" next to them, because the plan is for another debt exclusion to not go away after 20 years. Remember the one from back in 1996, that was suppose to be paid off in 2016 but now will not be paid off until 2019, well the plan was/is (appears to be) to just keep that on the tax rolls and add the $1.74 to that and that will make the "new" debt payments for the next 28 years.
All of this can be verified with some work and time.
posted by Jeff Bennett
Now, what follows is from a letter to editor in the Gardner news around this time last year, 2015:
The Templeton Center site has been approved by architects, engineers and the Massachusetts School Building Authority. A few have said that we need a new school but is too costly. The cost to Templeton resulting from state reimbursement is 24.8 million. The annual residential tax is $1.74 per 1,000 home valuation.
From information at Town meeting on November 9, 2015 and from other meetings, as well as a debt calculator on the website of MA DLS, 24 million dollars for 28 years at 3.5% would mean a yearly payback of about 1.4 million dollars.
If we take the information from the Assessors office and compare it to the information given at the Town Meeting, I do not see anyway for $1.74 to work, not close. Consider that back in 2015, I believe the information available was $1.00 per thousand would raise $556,000.00. Again, $1.74 per thousand does not work. So why is that? Is that some new math? Using the information from the Assessors office, $2.00 per thousand would raise almost 1.2 million dollars, but we have to have 1.4 million per year, so again, where did this $1.74 come from? Time to get honest, time to be conservative, time to be real, pick one, just be honest and tell people that it is not going to be $1,74, it will be $2.34 per thousand or $2.50 per thousand.
By the way, just for informational purposes, on those documents available, the $1.74 per thousand had the words "net increase" next to them, because the plan is for another debt exclusion to not go away after 20 years. Remember the one from back in 1996, that was suppose to be paid off in 2016 but now will not be paid off until 2019, well the plan was/is (appears to be) to just keep that on the tax rolls and add the $1.74 to that and that will make the "new" debt payments for the next 28 years.
All of this can be verified with some work and time.
posted by Jeff Bennett
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