By Alice Waugh
Faced with the prospect of increased costs for Lincoln students at Minuteman High School and the uncertainty about host community compensation, the Capital Planning Committee openly wondered about the possibility of having Lincoln withdraw from the Minuteman regional school district.
The CapComm discussed various options after a Wednesday evening presentation from Minuteman officials describing the layout of the proposed $145 million new school building and the programs it would offer students. The officials did not name a specific dollar amount they would be seeking from the town because final cost figures and MSBA reimbursements are not yet known. Consequently, many of the committee’s questions focused on both in-district and out-of-district enrollment figures and other issues concerning each town’s payment share will be determined.
After the presentation, CapComm member and Selectman Peter Braun updated other committee members on the status of negotiations over the Minuteman district’s revised regional agreement (RRA) and a proposed intramunicipal agreement (IMA) whereby the district would compensate Lincoln for being the school’s host community.
Among other things, the RRA would increase Lincoln’s per-student cost even beyond the cost of the new building because it would use the so-called “wealth factor” (a town’s property values and income) in calculating operating costs as well as capital costs. This would translate to a doubling of the added per-student cost from roughly $8,000 to $16,000, Braun said.
To compensate for that added expense, Braun and Arlington Selectman Peter Dunn negotiated a proposed intramunicipal agreement whereby the district would pay Lincoln $138,000 a year, rising with inflation. But on Tuesday night, the Minuteman School Committee (MSC) was lukewarm to that idea. Instead of approving the IMA and RRA, they deferred a vote until after district selectmen meet for further discussions on Thursday night (December 17).
“I thought we had successfully negotiated [the IMA] with the Arlington selectman and the superintendent. The number felt right, but the School Committee basically wasn’t too happy with that,” Braun said at the CapComm meeting. Some towns had previously objected to having any host community compensation included in the RRA, and some MSC members on Tuesday indicated they weren’t at all sure that their selectmen would approve the payment to Lincoln even as part of a separate IMA.
CapComm member Maria Hylton asked Braun if it was true that the selectmen and Lincoln’s MSC representative, Sharon Antia, were “not on the same page… that makes us extremely vulnerable.”
“There’s been some divergence of support for what we’re trying to do,” Braun acknowledged.
If the MSC votes on Monday to approve the RRA and bonding for the school project, district towns must schedule special Town Meetings within 60 days to ratify the agreement and, if they wish, vote to withdraw from the district. Under the RRA, towns can withdraw at any time, but any town that does so after the 60-day period will still be liable for a share of the new school building’s capital costs.
Towns must also approve bonding for the project, but it’s unclear if they must do so within the 60-day timeframe or if they have until the MSBA deadline for local approval in June.
CapComm member Audrey Kalmus wondered if it would make more sense for Lincoln to withdraw from the district and send its students to Minuteman as out-of-district students, which could mean a somewhat higher per-student cost but more financial flexibility, since the town would pay a smaller share of capital costs.
If Lincoln does decide to vote at a special Town Meeting in February on withdrawing from the district, “it will need some hard work real quick by townspeople” to come up with cost analyses and other options for its vocational-technical students, Braun said.
“I think we should preserve the [withdrawal] option,” committee member Jim Henderson said.
Under another scenario, Lincoln could vote to reject the RRA. For towns that want to withdraw, this would preserve the current requirement for unanimous approval from the 16 towns, which would be problematic. This might not sit well with neighboring towns including Sudbury that have already said they want to withdraw.
“Would Sudbury be just ballistic?” asked Hylton, noting that the two towns still have to work together regarding Lincoln-Sudbury Regional High School.
Arlington, which stands to gain the most from an RRA, has said they will oppose the building project if the RRA is not approved.
“It sounds very Machiavellian, but there is a rationale for calling their bluff. They would be faced with the question of ‘Do we really want to stand in the way of this project?’” Braun said. As for having to face that town’s anger, “what are they going to do do? There are only so many flames you can throw,” he added.
Asked why some towns are in favor of the RRA and school project even though it will cost them more money, Braun said, “I don’t know. There seems to be a sense that this is a valuable institution in general for society, so some of the towns joined back in the 1970s and created a good thing for our economy and our society for a population that needs this. The harder thing for me is why Lincoln should subsidize Arlington’s budget.”
Braun said his stance in discussions with other towns is based on the belief that Lincoln residents and officials want host community compensation, judging by comments at the last two Town Meetings.
“I want people to tell me if they feel that’s not the case. It’s not me—it’s the town that will speak, ultimately,” he said. “Maybe people and even our own School Committee member may say ‘it’s all about the school and all the rest is just underbrush’.”
“It’s pretty high underbrush,” commented CapComm member Al Schmertzler.
If the school building was not in Lincoln would Lincoln be withdrawing from the Minuteman district? If the answer is yes I think we need to seriously consider withdrawing. It doesn’t make any more sense for Arlington with it’s large population to have decisions driven by the needs of the small towns than it does for Lincoln to contribute at a level that is only cost effective if we send more students than we reasonably have.
I understand the selectmen’s concern about losing control of a very large institution, but I have to think that any plan that gives the towns sending the majority of students to the school fair representation in the school building and other decision processes is going to mean a loss of control for us.
Arlington certainly has a much larger commercial base than Lincoln has from which it must get income. Are residential property values the sole basis for Arlington’s determination that Lincoln is a much wealthier town, and Lincoln should pay more to subsidize students from their town? I don’t think so! Would more people with children move to Arlington to get such a deal? There are many people in Lincoln who are no richer than average residents of Arlington. Many in Lincoln are now retired, have no school age children and are living on fixed incomes. Should they be forced to sell their main asset because real estate taxes rise so dramatically due to skyrocketing multiple school building costs and unfair assessment to subsidize students other towns?