community center*

By Dilla Tingley

I hope everyone was able to review the community center options recently published in the Lincoln Squirrel and the Special Town Meeting mailing that went to all households in Lincoln.

The Special Town Meeting on December 2 is an opportunity for us to greatly improve the inadequate facilities occupied by our very special and hard-working COA&HS and PRD [Council on Aging & Human Services, and the Parks and Recreation Department] and the excellent LEAP after school program. All three are extremely valuable resources in our special community. They deserve proper accommodation.

The 100% option provides a space that would comfortably house existing programs for COA&HS, PRD, LEAP and also accommodate activities of a number of other town organizations, with some room for modest growth. It would demolish all existing ancient pods and provide green, new construction with some architectural amenity that would be a lasting legacy for our special town.

The 75% option is a pared-down version with reduced space, just adequate for current programming and little opportunity for use by other organizations. It tears down pods B and C but just renovates pod A for the LEAP program.

The 50% option, which we will present as required by the Town Meeting in November 2022, does not even provide for current programming. It basically gives COA&HS and PRD the space equivalent to two of our current pods and leaves LEAP in an unrenovated pod C which will require further appropriation at a later, less convenient time.

Our wonderful town deserves and will benefit greatly from a handsome new and spacious facility for community gathering. Please come on December 2 and support a needed and meaningful new building for generations to come.

Dilla Tingley represents the COA&HS on the Community Center Building Committee.

“My Turn” is a forum for readers to offer their letters to the editor or views on any subject of interest to other Lincolnites. Submissions must be signed with the writer’s name and street address and sent via email to lincolnsquirrelnews@gmail.com. Items will be edited for punctuation, spelling, style, etc., and will be published at the discretion of the editor. Submissions containing personal attacks, errors of fact, or other inappropriate material will not be published.

From top: the 100% option, the 75% option, and the 50% option.

The Community Center Building Committee on November 15 eliminated one of the two 75% options that had been under consideration and will present the three final plans (100%, 75% and 50%) for a “preferred option” vote at the Special Town Meeting on December 2. 

Whichever option wins will be sent on for developing more detailed plans and cost estimates ahead of an Annual Town Meeting and ballot box vote in March to approve bonding to fund construction.

Until last month, there were two options priced at about $18.75 million (75% of the maximum price of the earlier $25 million estimate), one with two stories and the other with just one. The committee voted to discard the two-story 75% option and asked ICON architects to develop a second 75% option that would include renovation of the LEAP pod.

On November 14, architects presented the latest versions of the four options, and the following night, they removed what was being called the “75% B” option from consideration. That scheme was eliminated largely because it would have moved the play area that’s now behind the pods farther northeast into the hillside. The architects and committee members agreed that the “75% A” option was better because it allowed for more green space. 

The 100% and 50% design schemes are essentially unchanged from earlier meetings. The 50% option has no activity room, and the multipurpose and fitness rooms are smaller than in other options while the mechanical room is larger because there isn’t any attic space.

“When I look at the 50% plan I kind of cringe — the square footage for the community center is so shrunk. I don’t see how anybody can truly enjoy the space because everybody would be tripping over each other,” Lori Leo said at the November 14 presentation. Leo is the director of Magic Garden but is not on the CCBC.

On December 2, the option that wins a majority after a ranked-choice voting procedure (first by ballot then by standing vote) will advance. The vote to fund the project in March must win a two-thirds majority at Town Meeting and a simple majority at the ballot box a few days later.

Editor’s note: this article was updated on October 17 to correct erroneous statements about the third option now being developed, and about the approval margin required for selection of a preferred option at the December 2 Special Town Meeting.

Based on resident feedback, architects will put aside the two-story 75% community center option and substitute another option in the 50%-to-75% price range ($12.5 million to $18.75 million). 

Residents saw presentations of four options at the State of the Town meeting on September 30 and ranked them in order of preference in person via a total of 524 paper and online survey responses. (Note: the drawings at the bottom of the September 28 article headlined “Community center options readied for SOTT” have been updated to show the labels that were inadvertently omitted earlier.)

Results of the SOTT and online surveys collected by the CCBC (click to enlarge).

The 100% option got the highest number of first-choice votes but also the highest number of “I would not vote for this option” entries, with the two cohorts almost canceling each other out. The two-story 75% option got the fewest first-place votes. None of the four in the poll reached the 67% that will be required for eventual funding approval in March; a vote on the preferred option at the Special Town Meeting on December 2  requires only a simple majority. The CBCC analysis, along with replies as to why the respondents voted the way they did, can be found here.

The Community Center Building Committee delved further into the data on October 1 as they tried to discern what sort of proposal could get over the finish line. If the two-story 75% option were taken off the table and the SOTT survey were reranked and recounted, the one-story 75% option would get 65.8%. The data also showed that this option might get a 73% “yes” share if the 100% option were also theoretically removed from consideration. 

The current plan is to present four options to residents on December 2:

• The current 100% option, “tightened up” to trim some cost and reduce the size of the large community gathering space
• The current 75% one-story option
• A third option comprising a slimmed-down version of the 75% one-story option that would be smaller and less expensive but also includes renovation of the LEAP pod
• The current 50% with some “modest adjustments”

The CCBC also considered discarding the 100% option but decided against it. “You’re doing the town a disservice if you don’t continue the work” to refine that option along with the others, committee member Rob Stringer said. “I think we deserve to have a look at the 100%… A lot of people said they would vote for it.”

Given that there will be at least three options to choose from, the CCBC discussed structuring the December 2 voting procedure similar to that used in June 2018 when residents selected the preferred option for the school project. At that Town Meeting, officials used voting machines to narrow five options down to three. A second vote then resulted in the winning option gaining 74% of the vote, comfortably over the required 67% supermajority.

Architects will present the next set of options on November 1 to the CCBC, which has another public forum scheduled for November 14.

In the September 28 story headlined “Community center options readied for SOTT,” the image gallery at the bottom has been updated to include the newest versions supplied by ICON Architects.

A summary of the latest community center options. Click image to enlarge.

(Editor’s note: the image gallery at the bottom of this post was updated on September 29.)

After some final tweaks this week, the community center design options are ready for prime time at Saturday’s State of the Town meeting. Meanwhile, some residents are embarking on a fund-raising effort to defray some of the cost.

As before, there are three main options pegged at 100%, 75%, and 50% of the $25 million estimate for the 2018 concept. There are one-story and two-story versions of Option 2 (2a and 2b) with almost equivalent square footage and price tags.

Option C, unlike the other two, does not include renovating pod C for LEAP — and some members of the Community Center Building Committee remarked at their September 27 meeting that this is something of a false choice. Pod C definitely needs work and it would make more sense to do it along with the rest of the project rather than put it off and have costs escalate even further — not to mention construction disruption around the new community center, CCBC chair Sarah Chester said.

Adding the $3.4 million cost of renovating pod C would bring Option 3 from $12.5 million to $15.99 million — still less than Options 2a and 2b ($18.75 million and $18.72 million respectively). However, that 50% option would result in a community center smaller than the 13,000 square foot minimum recommended.

CCBC member Dilla Tingley said she would advise SOTT attendees that “if you want that option plus LEAP [renovation], please look at the 75% options because they’re a better solution” from a design perspective.

An earlier issue of whether or how to include space for the school maintenance functions now in pod A has been settled, as the schools have agreed to locate that facility in the lower level of the main Hartwell building. However, there will be some as-yet-unknown cost for the move, since it’s no longer part of the community center project budget.

SOTT attendees will see the design options on large posters and have the opportunity to express a preference on a paper form or later online. Forms and a dropbox will also be available at Town Hall for those who can’t attend SOTT or want to complete the form after more time for thought.

“We are starting to approach individuals who we think are supportive of the community center and have the ability to make significant contributions,” said Peter von Mertens, a member of the fundraising group. “We have a challenge grant of $1 million from the Friends of the Lincoln Council on Aging. We plan to meet that by getting several major donations and also raise funds through naming opportunities for spaces in the community center building such as the lobby/lounge, multipurpose room, and the exercise and fitness area. As the project gets more specific in its design we can get more specific with naming opportunities.”

The group has approached one foundation for financing the kitchen area, “and we plan to reach out to several others,” he added. “We have a pledge form that allows people to make a gift that will only be given after the town votes to have the project go forward.”

Below are some screenshots from the September 27 presentation by ICON architects. Complete information will be available on posters and handouts at Saturday’s State of the Town meeting.

Click on the images below to see larger versions with captions.

If the town borrows $10 million (for example) to build a community center, Lincoln homeowners can expect a property tax increase of $290–$309 per year, or a hike of 1.7–1.8%, according to the Finance Committee.

In a September 18 presentation (14-minute video with slides here; just slides here), FinCom chair Andy Payne outlined what the town can afford to borrow and how various borrowing levels would affect taxes. Current cost estimates for a community center range from $13.73 million to $24.0 million depending on which design option voters approve.

In fiscal 2023, the median tax bill was $17,488 on a median home value of $1,259,900. 

The FinCom figures assume a 30-year fixed bond purchased in early 2025 at an interest rate of 4.0–4.5% (the current municipal rate is 3.94%). Payne noted that some of the debt stabilization fund (currently $5.5 million) could be used to reduce the amount needed to borrow. 

Under the statutory debt limit, the town can borrow up to $40.7 million in addition to its existing debt. By another measure — maximum annual debt service — the borrowing ceiling is about $30 million, he said. Because the annual debt payments (as with fixed-rate home mortgage payments) remain the same for the entire 30-year term of the bond, debt service declines over time as a percentage of the entire town budget, which grows each year due to inflation.

“No one is arguing that we should run up to our debt limit or even close to it — this is just showing the lay of the land,” Payne said.

Other large capital projects on the horizon — though with great uncertainty as to cost and timing — include a road repair project (about $10 million in five to seven years), purchase of more land for the town cemetery (seven figures in about 10 years), a ladder truck for the Fire Department (about $1.5 million in about 10 years), and a new DPW facility in 10-15 years for $15–$20 million.

“This is absolutely the most debated and controversial slide in the entire presentation. There are items on this list that will never happen and other items not on this list that will come into play,” Payne said. “The point is that FinCom and the Capital Planning Committee and town staff are very mindful of the town’s other possible capital needs.”

The Community Center Building Committee will meet on Wednesday, Sept. 27 at 7 p.m. to finalize its presentation at the September 30 State of the Town meeting (Zoom link here).