(Editor’s note: this article was updated on November 18 to include clarifications and additional document links.)
By Alice Waugh
At the State of the Town meeting on November 15, hundreds of Lincoln residents asked questions and heard cost estimates for two projects that are on parallel discussion tracks heading for Town Meeting in the spring: a school building project and a community center.
The Lincoln School needs millions of dollars in basic repairs as well as improvements such as cafeterias and other upgrades to improve education, while the Council Aging, now in cramped quarters in Bemis Hall, also urgently needs better space, town officials said.
“In both cases, doing nothing is not an option,” Selectman Renel Fredriksen said at the start of the meeting.
Community center
Carolyn Bottum, director of the Council on Aging (COA), took turns with Dan Pereira, director of the Parks and Recreation Department (PRD), presenting slides to illustrate problems with their current sites along with lists of programs they offer and images of other community centers.
Problems that COA clients and staff face in Bemis Hall include inadequate parking, danger to clients on foot and in cars from the traffic on Bedford Road, lack of privacy for counseling, difficult handicapped access to the COA space, lack of social space aside from the kitchen, and lack of a handicapped bathroom with a stall, meaning anyone who falls in the only bathroom that’s big enough for people using walkers must be rescued by COA staff in full view of the lobby. Bottum also noted that since the COA moved into Bemis Hall in 1983, the senior population in Lincoln has almost doubled from 1,000 to 1,900 residents, or almost one-third of the town’s population.
The PRD is happy with its location on the school campus, which gives it access to the Codman Pool, the nearby Hartwell pod that houses LEAP and the PRD’s summer camp, and school facilities such as the gyms, Pereira said. However, the programs need more space in various sizes, and the pods, though they have have basic maintenance over the years, require more substantial repairs and renovations. The buildings in their present state “are more of a holding pattern than a long-term solution,” he said.
The PRD, which needs about 14,000 square feet of space, will stay in its Hartwell location even if a community center to serve the COA as well as numerous other community groups were located elsewhere in town. The COA needs about 9,700 square feet, so separately the two groups would need a total of 23,700 square feet. However, if a community were located on the Hartwell campus, it would save space since some of it could be used by both the PRD and COA, necessitating only 19,000 total square feet for a single facility.
“We’re trying to satisfy all the needs of the various demographics in Lincoln… a community center would not be just for the COA,” even if it were not co-located with the PRD, said Community Center Study Committee (CCSC) chair Penny Billings. Community centers in other nearby towns include spaces for group exercise, computer use, medium-sized meetings, a nurse’s office, a coffee shop and even a gift shop, Bottum said.
Abacus Architects and Planners, consultants to the CCSC, showed slides of all five sites being considered for a community center: Hartwell/Ballfield Road, the Pierce House (either an addition or a second free-standing building), the current Department of Public Works site, the MBTA commuter parking lot at Lincoln Station, and Bemis Hall itself, which could be expanded to the south into the adjacent hillside.
In a CCSC survey of residents after an October 8 charrette (see the Lincoln Squirrel, Oct. 14, 2014), Hartwell was the clear favorite, a sentiment that was echoed at the State of the Town by audience comments and wall posters where attendees were asked to stick a paper dot on the site they felt was best.
Regarding the Pierce House idea, “I think it’s a tragedy to impose another building next to that wonderful historic building, “ said resident Harriet Todd, adding that the commuter lot site is less than ideal because users would have to contend with mall traffic. Also, Lincoln could risk losing its train station if the MBTA saw that it was cutting the number if commuter spots, said former Selectman Sara Mattes.
While it would be costly to relocate the DPW, that move would result in some extra land for the town that could be sold to offset some of the construction costs. However, some questioned whether that would be in the town’s best interests. Also, the transfer station site is served by a right of way granted by the National Park Service, which is not amenable to expanding usage of that area to include a DPW.
As for Bemis Hall, the adjacent land that would have to be dedicated to the building’s expansion is “Lincoln’s Lexington Green,” said resident Steve McCarthy. “You’re going to get a lot of divisiveness if you try to make that happen.” For a town dedicated to preserving open space and historic landmarks, taking that land to enlarge Bemis Hall “would be more of a tragedy than [expanding] the Pierce House,” he said.
Resident Jeff Eaton wondered if Bemis Hall would become excess inventory if it were vacated by the COA, but Fredriksen noted that selectmen have already had multiple requests from other groups for a share of the space. “There is no danger at all of it going unused,” she said.
David Pollak, an architect with Abacus, outlined estimated costs and other issues for the five community center sites. Other than the Ballfield Road site, costs include repairs to the Hartwell pods so they could continue to be used long-term by the PRD.
Ballfield Road — put a two-story, 20,000-square-foot building somewhere on the site of the current pods and parking lot, perhaps with a new entrance from Lincoln Road northeast of Ballfield Road
- Savings of about 5,000 square feet by co-locating PRD and COA.
- Could coordinate construction and swing space with the school building project.
- Net cost: $9.5 million to $13.5 million
Bemis Hall — extend the basement level to the south and add a new driveway to the south of that; add more parallel parking along Bedford and Lexington Roads.
- Cost includes $5.5 to $6 million for site work plus $2 million to $4.5 million for repairs and renovations to the Hartwell pods for long-term use by the PRD.
- Net cost: $7.5 million to $10.5 million
Lincoln Station — construct a one-story building primarily for use by the COA.
- The site is a bit small and is already used for commuter parking.
- An underground garage would probably have to be included.
- Cost includes $2 million to $4.5 million for Hartwell pod renovations.
- Net cost: $11 million to $14.5 million
Current DPW site — build a community center and parking on the northern portion of the land and sell the rest for other development; relocate the DPW to the transfer station.
- Construction including environmental site cleanup would cost $6-6.5 million, plus $5-7 million to relocate the DPW, minus the value of excess land gained on Lewis Street.
- Cost includes $2 million to $4.5 million for Hartwell pod renovations.
- Net cost: $11 million to $16 million
Pierce House — two scenarios, both of which would include expanding and paving the parking area and $2 million to $4.5 million for Hartwell pod renovations:
1. Build a two-story addition to the existing house, which would also require “significant but delicate renovations” to bring the entire building up to code, Pollak said.
- Cost includes $2 million to $4.5 million for Hartwell pod renovations.
- Net cost: $8 million to $11 million
2. Build another second one-story building southwest of the house with more square footage than an attached addition.
- Net cost: $7 million to $10 million
School building project
Dore and Whittier, the architectural firm hired by the School Building Advisory Committee, previously compiled two lists individual repair and renovation projects: one with more than 100 facility repairs and upgrades, and the other with educational/programmatic improvements (see the Lincoln Squirrel, Nov. 11, 2014). At the State of the Town, residents got a recent school building project history and definitions of terms, and a packet showing three families of options for meeting these two sets of needs:
- Option 1: Facilities needs only (both immediate and near-term) — $27.2 million
- Option 2: Facilities needs plus “a la carte” educational enhancements — $29.5 million to $47.6 million
- Option 3: Facilities needs plus comprehensive educational enhancements — $54.7 million to $58.8 million
Even the most basic package of facilities repairs would be extensive enough to trigger a state requirement for bringing the entire school into compliance with accessibility codes, which would result in additional costs, so many line items actually can’t be selected individually.
“The best way to understand individual actions is as a whole in realistic building projects,” said Jason Boone of Dore and Whittier.
After the presentation, residents were invited to place sticky dots and Post-It Notes with comments on wall posters. At a public forum on December 2, residents will help the SBAC and Dore and Whittier narrow down the options in preparation for a final report in January.
The “immediate needs” to maintain the health and safety of students and teachers include:
- A new roof for the entire school
- Two new boilers
- An emergency generator
- A sprinkler system and upgrades to the fire alarm system
- A new exterior wall for the Reed gym
Projects in this category would cost $8.4 million, but another $3.8 million in “code trigger” work would also have to be done, bringing the total to $12.2 million. “Near-term needs” would cost another $17 million in addition to the immediate needs. This list includes:
- Upgrading the air handling system to make it more reliable and efficient and to add air conditioning
- Upgrading classroom lighting for energy efficiency and glare reduction
- Replacing some of the windows and plumbing
- Upgrading the electrical and technology infrastructure
- Adding an intruder security system
- Removing hazardous materials that are now encapsulated but would be uncovered by other work
The architects also listed a third category of “deferrable needs” that includes replacing the remaining lighting, renovating the girls’ locker room, paving and curbing, regrading the central playing field, and new furnishing and equipment for a total of $7.7 million.
Programmatic upgrades
In addition to the facilities upgrades, the school needs work to improve the quality of teaching and learning and to achieve the district’s educational vision as presented by Becky McFall, superintendent of schools. That vision includes having the flexibility to teach to an ever-wider variety of student abilities and learning styles, and achieving “authentic learning” through a variety of educational experiences, not all of which can take place in a traditional classroom, she said.
A modernized physical layout and features of a school would improve the quality of education by allowing for programmatic flexibility with spaces of various sizes for groups ranging from an entire grade to a regular class to just a few students needing extra attention alongside the rest of the class, McFall said as she summarized the educational vision she presented to the SBAC and residents on October 16 (see video beginning at the 8:45 time mark).
The school’s layout should also offer more opportunities for formal and informal collaboration among faculty and students, as well as a digital infrastructure that “allows us to use technology for new ways of learning—ways that we haven’t even conceived of, but our students have,” McFall said, using as an example a student idea for letting kids who get a correct answer to a math problem jump or shoot a basket. Finally, the building should make it easy and safe for students to connect to the community and the environment as they learn, she said.
“We are doing this now, but the spaces are not ideal,” McFall said, noting that small groups must now meet in the hallways or in tiny windowless rooms formerly used for storage.
To improve teaching and learning, the school needs improved classroom acoustics, one or two dedicated kitchen/cafeterias, new second-grade classrooms and small group spaces, the architects said. As Option 2, they presented a series of “a la carte” educational cost options, all of which would include the immediate and near-term facilities work, that ranged from $29.5 million to $47.6 million.
Option 3 would encompass the entire array of both facilities and educational enhancements, differing only in the proportion of renovation to new construction; these would range in price from $54.7 million to $58.8 million. For comparison, an entirely new school would cost about $66.3 million at this point, Boone said.
In 2012, voters narrowly rejected a comprehensive building project that would have replaced the current L-shaped school with a new building and roadway configuration. That project was estimated at $49 million, although the Massachusetts School Building Authority had agreed to provide $21 million of that amount.
Although Lincoln can reapply for state funding, any project would have to meet all of the identified facilities and educational needs as defined by the state to win MSBA approval, and even if some funding was eventually offered, work could not begin for several years. The estimates presented were in 2014 dollars, and the town should expect increases of 3 to 6 percent a year, Dore and Whittier said.
Audience reaction
Residents at the meeting were asked to offer their thoughts based on the assumption that the town would have to foot the entire bill for a school project.
“When you go to a restaurant and order a la carte, you pay a lot more,” said resident John Hammond. “You can save a lot of costs when you do things together.”
Responding to a comment that the quality of teachers is more important the the quality of the building they work in, McFall agreed while also noting that expenditures for teachers and facilities come from “two different pots.”
“Absolutely our teachers are the most important factor in providing high-quality education for our kids,” she said. “We’ll pursue our strategic plan and vision no matter what our building looks like, but some of these improvements to facilities will help us get to where we want to be and have our children learn the way we want them to learn.”
“We’re only going to end up paying more the longer we wait. It’s become clear to me that the most financially responsible thing is to build the maximum building that we can now, because the marginal cost [of a larger vs. smaller project] isn’t really that great,” said resident Audrey Kalmus. “I would hate for people 20 years from now to think that we were penny-wise and pound-foolish.”
One of the major reasons why people move to Lincoln is for the schools, and most surrounding towns have recently built or rebuilt their schools, said School Committee member Al Schmertzler. “We want people to come here and buy the houses that people like me will ultimately have to leave, and if schools aren’t good, we won’t get the younger people we’re getting here now,” he said.
A top-quality school will also attract top-quality teachers, argued another resident, saying, “I encourage you to think of it not just as a building but as a way of recruiting the talent we want to teach our kids.”
If you renovate only a portion of the school building rather than everything at once, you also need to figure in the costs down the road for eventually renovating the rest of it, another resident noted.
But the dollar figures were hard to swallow for some. “The number $29 million is in my head all the time because that’s the number I was comfortable spending [as the town’s share of the 2012 project], and I haven’t changed my mind yet,” said resident Jonathan Dwyer.
Financial impacts
Although it didn’t come up for discussion, the Finance Committee provided a handout showing the property tax impacts of borrowing various amounts at an interest rate of either 3.6 percent or 4.6 percent and over a period of either 20 years or 30 years (click here for an excerpt). The analysis was based on a median property value of $883,600 and a median tax bill of $12,503 and is based on net borrowing amounts funded by debt exclusion. Debt stabilization funds and Community Preservation Act funds could also play a role.
The handout also included a list of property tax exemptions for which residents may be eligible based on age, income, financial hardship and/or veteran status.
Thinking ‘holistically’
As the town considers both a school project and a community center, “we want to be very careful not to pit one group against another,” said Fredriksen, reminding the crowd inaction on either project is “unacceptable.”
“The Hartwell pods are less than perfect condition and the COA is in a very untenable situation right now. We need to meet the needs of all the citizens of Lincoln,” she added.
“The number one thing we have to do as a town is think about this holistically,” said resident Moha Patel. The town needs a combined project that meets the needs of the school, the COA and PRD, she added, “but I’m not sure where that decision point lies.”
Although the Board of Selectmen does not have sole authority to determine what will come up for a vote at Town Meeting in the spring, Selectman Noah Eckhouse urged residents to come to their meetings and offer input. “Help us work it out together, because this is tricky stuff,” he said.
Todd suggested drafting a warrant article in such a way that neither project could not go through without the other. “I would hate to see one project voted in and the other missing by 10 or 20 votes. I think it would really tear the town apart,” she said.