State again says no to Lincoln School funding

By Alice Waugh

Lincoln school officials learned late last week that they will not be considered for state funding to help pay for a major school project this year.

Lincoln submitted one of 97 statements of interest received by the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) in 2015 from all over the state, according to a letter to parents from Superintendent of Schools Rebecca McFall and School Committee Chair Jennifer Glass.

The school administration and School Committee will ask for feedback from the MSBA on the statement of interest that Lincoln submitted last April and their rationale for not being invited into the process at this time, McFall and Glass wrote.

This is the second rejection from the MSBA after it initially approved a comprehensive school project in 2012. That project was slated to cost $49 million, and the MSBA would have reimbursed Lincoln for approximately $21 million of that. But voters at a Special Town Meeting (which required a two-thirds majority to move the project forward), narrowly defeated the measure, forfeiting the promised MSBA money and sending Lincoln back to the drawing board for the state funding process. In 2013, the town applied again and was turned down.

A year ago, another in a series of studies on the school found that even basic repairs would cost Lincoln a minimum of $27 million. Consultants presented a range of options culminating in a comprehensive project that would also include educational enhancements including new second-grade classrooms as well as at least one cafeteria and kitchen would cost $55 to $59 million, although some of that would have been paid for by the state.

As it now stands, the town will have to foot the entire bill for whatever work is done on the school, assuming it does not try again for MSBA funding in 2016.

After the 2012 defeat, many residents felt that the School Building Committee and other town officials did not solicit enough public feedback during the process of designing the school project. Discussion and planning since then has included numerous public forums, and Glass and McFall vowed to maintain this greater transparency.

Moving forward together

“The town’s voice is essential in determining our next steps. No actions will be taken without gathering input from the community. The School Committee and Board of Selectmen will work together to plan an open and inclusive process, and we will continue to keep you informed as we move forward,” they wrote.

“It is disappointing, but we also know this is often a multiyear process,” Glass said at the December 21 Board of Selectmen’s meeting where she appeared to formally notify them of the MSBA decision. “We’ll come back to figure out what our next steps will be and move forward together as a town.”

The selectmen noted that residents had expressed strong support for a school project at last year’s Town Meeting, and Glass said she had received several messages urging her to “keep courage and keep going.”

“This may be a tree that takes many swings to get down,” Selectman Noah Eckhouse said.