government

Crucial meetings on school project begin Wednesday

January 7, 2013

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

State gives town two months on school building project

December 20, 2012

By Alice Waugh

State officials have given Lincoln another two months to decide how to proceed with the school building project, but they appeared to offer little wiggle room as far as allowing changes to their approved plan.

The town has until February 28, 2013 to “assess community support and examine how best to proceed,” said the December 14 letter to Superintendent of Schools Becky McFall from Mary Pichetti, director of capital planning for the Massachusetts School Building Authority. McFall and School Committee Chair Jennifer Glass wrote on November 15 to ask for an extension to try to keep the project alive after it failed to get a two-thirds majority at the November 3 Town Meeting.

Selectmen won’t support town vote on ‘same’ school project

December 20, 2012

By Alice Waugh

The Board of Selectmen will not support the idea of bringing the “same exact” project to another Town Meeting, even if that was the only way to retain the state funding.

“It would be disrespectful of the Town Meeting process,” Selectman Renel Fredriksen said at the board’s December 17 meeting.

“I think it was very clear,” said Selectman Noah Eckhouse, referring to the November 3 Town Meeting vote at which the $49 million project failed to garner a two-thirds majority. “It may have been a majority [in favor], but it was a down vote. We don’t want to run the same project up the flagpole.”

Eckhouse added that he “might” support having a vote on a project that was “meaningfully different,” even though he knew there was “never a question” that the town would drop out of the pipeline for a promised state grant of $21 million for the project.

“There are many, many reasons people voted against it,” Braun said. “To just revisit it would be counterproductive for town culture and goodwill.”

When you consider the votes that would be necessary, “the numbers are daunting,” Braun said. The Town Meeting tally was 370 in favor of the project and 321 against (54 percent to 45 percent). If the same number of “no” votes were cast in a second Town Meeting, “another 270 people would have to show up and all vote yes” to achieve a two-third majority, he said.

Put another way, if the same group of 691 voters came to a second Town Meeting, 93 of them would have to switch their votes from “no” to “yes” for the measure to pass.

Town still awaiting word on extension request for school project

December 12, 2012

By Alice Waugh

School officials are still waiting for a response to their request from the state for more time to achieve enough “yes” votes to allow the school building project to go forward.

At a meeting of three town panels on December 5, Superintendent of Schools Becky McFall said she had spoken by phone to representatives of the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) and gotten “verbal approval of additional time to work with the community” until at least the end of February.

Town Office Building renovations coming along

December 6, 2012

The Lincoln Town Office Building

By Alice Waugh

Officials and workers have been pleasantly surprised at the craftsmanship they’ve discovered inside the walls of the century-old Town Office Building, whose renovation project is proceeding on schedule.

At a November 16 Council on Aging presentation, Richard Thuma of project manager Bargmann Hendrie + Archetype, Inc. and Assistant Town Administrator Anita Scheipers showed photos of the building’s interior wall structure with angled braces between the vertical studs, which is not something found in modern buildings. [Read more…] about Town Office Building renovations coming along

Community center feasibility report issued

November 3, 2012

By Alice Waugh

If Lincoln decides to create a community center to house the Parks and Recreation Department and the Council on Aging in a single building, the most logical site would be somewhere on the Ballfield Road school campus, but further discussion will be deferred until after the town votes on the school building project this fall.

In its report presented to the Board of Selectmen on July 30, the Community Center Feasibility Study Committee examined the current and future space needs of the two organizations and presented information about seven possible sites in town that might accommodate the Parks and Recreation Department (PRD) or the Council on Aging (COA), or potentially both in one multigenerational facility.

For existing and future programming over the next decade, the PRC needs 14,600 square feet of space and the COA needs about 9,700 square feet, but having both in one building would require only 19,300 square feet (5,000 less than the sum of the two separately) because they could share some of the space.

Bemis Hall, the current home of the COA, “is not well suited for use as a senior center” because of issues with insufficient handicapped access, the configuration of the space in the historic building, and not enough safely located parking. There are a few spaces in front of Bemis that require drivers to back out into busy Bedford Road, and if they park in the church lot across the street, they must cross the same road.

While the PRD “is very happy with its current location” in Hartwell pod C, the pods have code violations and general wear and tear that will have to be addressed even if the PRD stays put, the report said. There’s also uncertainty about the process for future repairs, since the PRD is “borrowing” its space from the Lincoln School Committee. Since they are not being used for educational purposes, there is little incentive for that committee to fund repairs. However, the pods could be formally decommissioned, which would effectively transfer authority over the space.

Similarly, the town will need to spend money on Bemis Hall (which formerly housed the PRD) even if the COA stays there. The town should move ahead with short-term improvements to the building to meet the current needs of the COA and then do a “thoughtful suitability assessment” for the best uses of the building, the report said.

“One way or another, Bemis Hall is going to continue to be used,” Selectman Peter Braun said.

The committee’s report looked at the pros and cons of seven potential sites for the PRC and/or the COA: the Hartwell area (including part of the administration building as well as the pods), part of the old Smith School after new construction is completed, Pierce House, the First Parish Church, the Groves, Farrington Memorial, and Lincoln Woods on Wells Road. For each, the report includes data on the suitability of the location; the adaptability of the existing structures; renovation or construction cost; and access, circulation and parking.

The notion of whether the town even wants a one-site community center needs more consideration by officials and residents, selectmen noted.

“We need to articulate a vision and then see what happens with the schools,” said feasibility committee member Bob Sutherland, referring to an upcoming town-wide vote on the proposed elementary school building project.

“This report is not an attempt to sell the town on a need for a community center,” noted Town Administrator Timothy Higgins. “It provides an objective jumping-off point for future discussions that the town will have.”

Selectman Renel Fredriksen praised the work of the committee and the report’s neutrality, though she commented, “I couldn’t help but walk away with some very definite opinions… and I’d be really surprised if a lot of people didn’t reach the same conclusions I did.”

“This is a fabulous report. You’ve done the town a great service,” Selectman Noah Eckhouse told committee members. Though it was finished later than originally planned, the committee spent only $13,000 of the $45,000 it was allocated for its work, even with the hiring of a consultant, he added.