The School Building Committee this week kicks off a series of meetings to ratchet up communication between residents and the SBC about what the school project should look like—or whether it should go forward under the current scenario at all.
The SBC is trying to regroup after the project failed to garner a two-thirds majority at Town Meeting on November 3. Members are treading a fine line, trying to learn what changes in the project will garner enough resident support while also knowing that if the town comes back with a “different project” than what the Massachusetts School Building Authority previously approved, a promised $21 million MSBA grant is off the table and the town must start the process from the start. Still to be determined is the extent of resident-supported tweaks to the plan, if any, that the MSBA will accept without considering the project to be “different.”
The town has until February 28 to inform the MSBA of how it wants to proceed.
The SBC will host a “Guiding Principles and Evaluation Criteria Workshop” on Wednesday, January 9 from 7-10 p.m. in Reed Gym. “Two years ago, the SBC reached out to the community to develop a set of guiding principles and criteria that were used to develop the school building project. Are they still the right criteria? Are there others that should be added? We need as many people as possible to participate in the upcoming series of meetings. The workshop on January 9th is an opportunity to review the educational and other criteria that were used to develop the school building project,” the SBC said an email to Lincoln School parents and others.
The SBC email also included these details about the meetings:
Wednesday, January 9
7:30-10:30 p.m., Reed Gym
GUIDING PRINCIPLES AND EVALUATION CRITERIA WORKSHOP
Wednesday, January 16
7:30-10:30 p.m., Reed Gym
CONSIDERING SITE AND DESIGN CONCERNS AND IDEAS
The SBC is soliciting site and design ideas from the public. If members of the community have ideas that require presentation time, please contact the School Committee at schoolcomm@lincnet.org by January 11 (date extended). There will also be an opportunity for the public to generate ideas and to discuss ideas that have been raised.
Tuesday, January 22
7:30-10:30 p.m., Reed Gym
PLAN FOR COMMUNITY CHARRETTES
Using the guiding principles and evaluation criteria from the January 9 meeting, evaluate several scenarios. To reach as many citizens as possible, the same event will be offered at two different times.
Community charrettes—two identical sessions to evaluate several scenarios:
- Sunday, January 27
1-4 p.m., Reed Gym - Thursday, January 31
7-10 p.m., Reed Gym
Information from the two events will be compiled by the SBC in order to determine its response to the MSBA.
Wednesday, February 6
7:30-10:30 p.m., Reed Gym
PLANNING THE RESPONSE TO THE MSBA