001the chair. I will call to order the school building committee and the school committee meeting for June 12th, 2025. And we will do a roll call. Jill, would you like to start? Sure. Jill F is present. Jane Reio, building committee and school committee, Milville. Sarah Peters CPAC representative in Blackstone resident. Harry Goddette, School Building Committee and School Committee, Blackstone. Aaron Fakco, school building committee, school committee, Milville. Charles Dunton, school building committee and school committee, Blackstone. Joe Spagen, director of finance and operations. Jill Pilgarani, assistant superintendent, director of student services. Jason Devalco, superintendent. Tyra Larkin, school building committee and school committee. Milville Tower Scobby School Committee Blackstone Scott Hebbit director of facilities Rachel Anderson School Building Committee Milville Board Selectman Jeff Silverstein School Building Committee Blackstone Finance Committee Matt Catalano um school committee Milville member Peter
002Olsen um school building committee Blackstone Mary Bolso school building committee Blackstone and Blackstone Jennifer Dean Wing School Building Committee buildable parent. Great. And our designer and um project manager teams, please project. I'm Mike Carroll with Collier's project leaders. I'm Greg Smallley with DRA Architects. Great. And I will now open the public hearing and we'll just do that. Um all in favor say I. I. Any opposed? Okay, our public hearing is now open. Jason, would you like Great. Thank you. Uh good evening everybody. Um just want to thank all of the uh committee members who are here tonight. Um a lot of work has happened uh to get us to this point and uh it's been many many uh people hours behind the scenes to get to get to this stage in our process. So I
003just want to thank everyone for their time, effort, energy on that. Also like to thank those who are in the audience tonight for the public hearing. We look forward to if you're going to you know share your insights and thoughts. We look forward forward to hearing them. Um, and to our family and friends who can't be here tonight that might be tuning in from home or or may see this after the fact, um, please know, and I want to really underscore this, this is not the last time that we will be having public conversation about this project. Uh, as many of you know who have been tuned in to this project started around 2020. As far as the the capital plan, um there has been so much discussion and there will be so much discussion
004from this point until uh we bring forward a vote to the community sometime uh in the spring of next year on whatever project and configuration is is put forward. Uh so if you were not able to be here tonight, uh please don't be worried about that. Um, we are having the public hearing tonight because, uh, we need to give direction to our architect, uh, Greg from DRRA and our onus project managers from Collers. That's Mike and Christina, uh, who are overseeing the project. We need to give them direction for a submission that is due to the Massachusetts School Building Authority at the end of August. I think it's August 28th. That submission is called a preferred schematic design. Uh, I won't get into the detail of that. uh leave that to the experts. Um but
005a key piece of that um you may hear it called I think it's at a PS R PSR. Okay. Uh so it's probably not design then it's probably preferred schematic something else. What is it? Report. Report. Sorry. Um but a but a big piece of that is the actual grade alignment in terms of what we're looking for in a potential new or in a renovated uh or building with an addition. Um, so, uh, tonight we're here to talk about that and, uh, but again, don't be anxious if you were not able to make it. There will be lots and lots and lots of public conversation from now through next spring. Uh, so, thank you, Madam Chair, for that. And then I'm going to turn it over to uh, our architect. Thank you, Jason. And tonight
006we will try to uh focus on the enrollment and potential uh grade alignments and what that impact may be as we um as we develop this building project a little bit further. The district submitted what's known as an S soi, a statement of interest. And to do that, you need to identify what you might want to be at the end of the project. and the district has um grappled with the grade alignments and how they fit into the buildings you own in the space that you you uh you currently have. So, we looked at the enrollments that went in and compared that to your current enrollments. In this graph here, if you look at the bottom four rows where it says total 6 through 12 down to totals 9 through 12, and the leftmost blue
007box, series of boxes is your current enrollment as of October of this year. And it's showing in in 6 through 12, 804 kids, 7 through 12, 6 7 68, in 8 through 12, 564, and 9 through 12 428. Um we forecast that out we projected it very roughly out over a decade and you see it will increase by about 10% for each one of those enrollments if you uh continue to grow at the pace that you've been growing postcoid. So since you since the SOI was submitted and that enrollment projection was completed, things have changed a bit and the MSBA approves the enrollment that you submitted and they stay with that. So that becomes a a factor as we move along. to get to tonight. We had pulled the um building committee and the school
008building committee as to what their preference may be for alignments of the grades and we were doing that to set the groundwork for tonight's meeting and for some other information gathering that we've done. So, we'll take the four alignments and and look at these. On the left of all of these, you'll see current school configuration and it tells you what's happening right now. So, Millville Elementary is is the central office. JFK is preK through 1. Maloney grades 2 and three. Partnet SE is 4 through 7 and the high school is currently 8 through 12. If we were to move to a 6 through 12 alignment using the um the the current buildings, it would most probably work to the district's advantage if Millville became grades preK through two. The enrollment that we're seeing in preK
009through two fits nicely into that building. JFK would work well to suit the central office. Maloney would essentially come offline from the needs of the district. Hartnet, where we're sitting, would fit grades 3 through five, which it does quite well, and you would build a new school for grades 6 through 12. So that would be the largest configuration that you would build and hence the most expensive configuration that you would build. On the next one, we look at 7 through 12 and current stays the same. Milville at this point would be grades preK through two. Kennedy central office. Maloney comes offline. Hartnet 3 through six. So it picks up another another grade level here. Building can accommodate it. It would um it would activate your lower level a little bit more than a 3 through
010five. Um good spaces down there. They're comparable on all the floor planes in this building. And the um difference is that you're coming up to go to lunch and to the gym instead of down from the upper level. And then the high school would be a 7 through 12. Um slightly smaller and therefore slightly less expensive to build. Um 8 through 12, we have Milville going to grades K through three. And this from an educational point of view and from a building point of view becomes a little bit more troublesome. Um that starts to max out that building. It pushes it very close to its capacity. It also gets a little bit further away from what a lot of educators feel is a a good uh grade alignment, age alignment of prek through two. Um
011what it does is move prek over to central office. So now we have a standalone prek program and we don't have the ability for um prek and k to share any type of services or play. And the playgrounds are particular for prek and k are um are playgrounds that the older kids can't play in. Um that puts Maloney offline again. Grades 4 through 7 through is here now. And though this building was built to accommodate that grade range, uh education has changed a bit. And we would be stretching this building at 4 through 7 and 8 through 12 in the new school. So our new school's gotten a little bit smaller and a little bit little bit cheaper to build. Probably programmatically not the optimal. Um we think that 9 through 12 is the um
012the the smallest building to build. It starts to run into the problems that were identified during the master plan of um limited programmatic offerings, limited uh curricular and extracurricular offerings for um 300 to 400 kids. Um Hartnet is now 6 through 8. Maloney is 3 through five. Milville is prek through two. So, Milville is fairly well right sized. Maloney is is working fairly well. Um, Hartnet works as a a middle school and the central office is taking part of Kennedy. So, the the complex, the Kennedy Maloney building is is working within its capacity. Um, maybe not with the ideal classroom arrangement, but it's there and you own it and it's in pretty good shape. So to to to set this up, we had pled as I said the the building committee and school committee and
013the um the leanings were um 7 to 12 8 to 12 with 7 to 12 leading. We want to always get that first because there's two ways to look at a building program. Um one is from the fiscal side. What's it cost to run it? How do you maximize this? How can we minimize transportation costs? How can we minimize building operation costs? So, we always we always lead with that. Then we follow with the educational piece and what do people think is the best alignment from an educational point of view. In this case, we asked the staff at the middle school and the high school in a um a blind survey um in a relatively short window. We had a um and a re a response rate that was I think north of 70% which
014was pretty amazing. We're usually pretty happy if we get anywhere north of 20% on a survey. And we asked them two pretty simple questions. What grade alignment would you prefer? And then get tell us why. And so their their grade alignment preferences were 8 through 12 and then 9 through 12. And it was a um fairly robust 8 through 12 response, which is not that surprising. It's a great alignment that's pretty easy to to understand um how everybody fits together and the social and emotional difference between an eighth grader and a ninth grader is usually a little bit easier to comprehend than a sixth or seventh grader up to that level. So, no big surprise there on those responses. And we asked them the second question of um tell us why, but what what's your
015thinking there? And there was no um there was no lack of answers um which was good, but there were a couple of common threads that we saw and it's all stuff that um starts to inform the school building committee on how to configure the building. How do you how do you accommodate what educators are telling you um they feel would be best for the kids? So, their concerns were about the maturity gap between grades 6 through 8 and those in 9 through 12. That's that is pretty much a given and and has been as long as there's been uh public schools and and that that age range. Um that was seen as probably a neutral. It's something that you could address in design of the building. um providing early exposure to high school expectations. Um
016that I guess is a more sophisticated way for what we've been saying is that you can be you can offer a larger curriculum offering, more extracurricular, more sports, more activities for the kids. Um the teachers are looking at it from from the professional point of view. There are role model opportunities. There's the ability for um modeling of expectations on both um uh diligence with schoolwork and application to social environment that is available if the building is put together. And then the um one of the guiding uh themes was if the younger grades are included, consider doing it in a dedicated space within the building. So a separate wing, a separate house, an academy. And that was expressed most strongly for 6 through 8 or 7 through 8. And then even somewhat at the eighth grade
017level, find a way to give these kids a place that is essentially theirs. And conversely, there was a number of statements saying, "Give the broader high school to the 9 through 12 year olds. Let them create some pride in in the high school being um being their place and and their building." So, we thought that that fit pretty well with expectations, provided a lot of guidance. There's 80 something comments in that survey. um that we'll uh we'll review with the building committee as we move forward. Um what we wanted to show you is a model school that we've talked about a couple of times with the committee. It's West Bridgewater, which uh Mike's group was involved with as the OPM. And what we want to make sure is that when we talk about an academy
018within a building, you're not conjuring up something that looks foreign. It it's it looks just like a regular school building. And what we're showing you on the screen here is the um all the way over to the left is the first floor plan which is has the publicly publicly accessible pieces to the left. So that's the gymnasium, the auditorium, those type of areas that the public may use when school is closed. And on the first floor, if you go in at door number one on the bottom and go to the right, you're in the middle school. So that's the lower grade configuration separated off by entrance and separated off by activities and it has the admin uh suite at its entrance. So if there is a a feeling that a high school or an older
019guy may make it down into that area, they have to go past the admin suite. And so you can set these buildings up to work in a way that they um they become self-controlling. And then the second floor plan in the center of the page is the upper level. So where it says four and five, that's the upper area of the gym and auditorium. What really matters to us is is from two 1314 over to the right. That's more or less the high school. Those are the high school classrooms. Excuse me one minute, Greg. Is there a virtual option for this? People are asking me. What do you mean? Can people like type in questions or ask questions or do you mean just watch it? No. Ask questions or No. No. Okay. It's it's streamed.
020I mean it's on they can watch the Yep. the uh meeting. Okay. So, that's um that's where we are with trying to fill in what were some of the the uh potentially lingering questions over grade alignment. And so if we cast ourselves back on what we talked about with the committees, then this current survey and the um the potential rearrangement of the spaces that you own, it um it will help to inform a bit perhaps on uh what might be the most economical way to move forward both in in um uh upfront costs for the new building to be constructed and then operational costs moving forward and taking care of the buildings that you own. Now, um, with that, I will turn it back to, uh, to you and take any questions you may have.
021Thank you. Um, does anyone have any comments, questions? Go ahead, Jeff. Um, Greg, could you just go through um we have we have preliminary costs um attached to each one of these um alignments and um we know that they're going to need to be modified, but there are there are millions of dollars in difference between every single one of these grade alignments. So I think it would be a good idea just for the public to understand that um whichever grade alignment is is selected that there is a a significant financial impact. So I I just wanted to see if you could sort of go over that a little bit and give us a rough idea as to um what the differences are going to be. Well, you're you're right in characterizing it that there's um
022there there are some pretty broad differences as you move up. And there are um and Mike can jump in here whenever he wants because this is his uh the part of the submitt that he put together there. There are preliminary cost documents that we need to put together by state requirement. Those that's what you're referring to. And the shorthand if anyone here is a a form 311. That's that's the form that we're talking about now and it's kind of the fair to say the first formal try at identifying all the costs and it's and formals and quotes in that one because it is very broad. Um, and what we're trying to do is is establish a potential building cost, which is everything that's bricks and mortar and goes in the ground and stays there. And
023then the soft costs, which are all of your professional fees, um, insuranceances, carrying costs, um, bonding costs, furniture, technology, all those pieces that, as I describe it, if you take the building and shake it upside down and it falls out, it's in the soft costs. If it stays in the building, it's in the building cost. And then there is a piece on that that projects the town's share versus the state's share. Where it starts to vary is as you develop more site for a particular format, the town will carry more of that cost because the state limits its involvement or its participation in site cost. Fortunately for what we have over there, that site cost is probably going to stay pretty similar no matter what you build. that that site is pretty well defined on
024where you can get to it. And so if we put a smaller building for the sake of this discussion, if we were to build a smaller new building down where the soccer field is, getting to it is the same cost whether it's for 9 through 12 or 6 through 12. Building down there is the same cost for those two buildings. So site cost is less of a factor in this as it may be in some other sites that we've uh we've worked with. the um the furniture cost is incremental. For every kid that you add to this, you add a cost for the furniture and a cost for technology. So that's almost a um a one for one cost increase. The buildings probably reach a threshold where they jump. You would it does. So um
025I had created different cost models for the different uh alignments and and provided those to the district because they asked it is pretty early for me to do that with that 311 form. That 301 form is typically more we we we touched base earlier about the preferred schematic design which is part of that preferred schematic report. Usually we're doing it at that level at that point but we did try to do it here. So as the buildings get larger there's a cost per square foot to build a building. Larger buildings cost more money. But the other thing to keep in mind is as you look at great configurations, I need a certain size gymnasium to fit a basketball court in it, for example. And if I have 6 to 12 alignment or I have 9
026to 12 alignment, that basketball court's not changing size substantially. So as you grow the number of students there, eventually you might need two basketball courts if you have a higher enough students. We don't have that in any of our situations, but it's it's similar with cafeterias and kitchens and and things of that nature that you need a minimum size kitchen just to have a functional kitchen and to double the the the amount of people that that kitchen is serving, it might only get 15 or 20% bigger, you know. So, so there's a certain, you know, I have to have a minimum of a,000 square feet and to double it, it goes to 1,200 square feet or something like that. It's not a lot more. So I think uh while the the larger enrollment gives you
027larger buildings and and greater cost that the the the the services that you get are are greater as well and you have that that economy of scale with a lot of those other departments that can service you know art rooms, band rooms, things like that aren't getting double because the enrollment got double. Is that does that get to where you were after Jeff? Um I would prefer a little more specificity. Um and the reason I I think um I don't know we seem to be dancing around this this uh this issue of the the cost but um and I I understand that the numbers that we already have are very preliminary but it's a very important decision that's being made here in terms of the grade alignment because it determines the ultimate cost of this
028project and so I think the public um if they want to have some sort of meaningful involvement in this in this decision. They need to know, you know, what's the difference between the 9 through 12 um versus the the 8 through 12 and 7 through 12 and the 6 through 12. Obviously, the 6 through 12 is going to be a lot more expensive because um uh it's covering more grades. It's going to require more space. Um my calculations are that that configuration is going to be something on the order of $10 million more than the um uh than the 7 through 12. And then um and then I mean we just keep getting um it's it's sort of a a stepbystep process, but there are millions of dollars difference between every single one of these
029alignments. And I just um I think it it's worthwhile for the public to understand that and to you know that that's not the only consideration obviously that um that goes into determining the great alignment but it is a very important one and we all I think we all know that the the ultimate cost is going to be very important when we eventually get down to um to voting on this next spring. Jeeoff, so to answer your question maybe a little bit more uh directly. So, for those those of you who don't know, the last building committee we had or two ones ago, like we said, we had those draft 311s. They were preliminary. They were making assumptions. It was just to get the ballpark conversation going because to your point, Jeff, there there there's a
030lot of differences, but I guess just to to throw it out there, um for the 9 to2 for the smallest option, again, high level, very preliminary, we were targeting somewhere around 120 million. for the 6 to 12 option is around 170. So to give you those numbers that that was the the range if you will that we were again very preliminary very high level good cost estimates just uh you know backing that that up but that was the range. So if that gets you more into that ballpark of what you were asking 31, can you can you sort of net out what the state aid would be so that you end up with a number that's substantially lower since you know that 55 or between 55 and 60% is going to be offset by by
031state aid. Just to be clear on that, it's 55% of the eligible costs. And there's a lot of complications within that 311 form, which uh we alluded to a little bit earlier. There's there's site limitations, there's dem demolition and abatement limitations, there's cost of the of the soft cost, there's co reimbursement on furniture, fixtures, and equipment. There's lots of different things there. So, we we we have provided that as a as a high level. We're certainly happy to talk about it, but I just don't want anybody to think that these are the final final numbers. Like we we don't even have a general building layout. These are based off of square footages and and and really uh it is a little early to be nailing trying to nail down the numbers at this point. And
032mind you, the 311s that were presented were for a totally new option for for each one that we we sent. So, you know, perhaps a little more efficient. I guess the assumption is it's doing it in one shot instead of different phased constructions if you did sort of the ad rena route. So I know we're saying a lot of caveats but that that um hopefully is answering your question I think a little bit more clearly. Those also did show kind of those what the um estimated total maximum grant would be. So it did itemize those differences. Right. J. Yeah. And I I believe I'm correct in the assumption the percentages will change if we build to what our num numbers are now not the numbers we submitted in the statement of interest that extra cost
033is on the communities like if we decide we want so so even if we estimated a percentage it's going to change if our numbers continue to grow the way that we've and that's why we are at great alignment. Correct. Because with great alignment drives program, right? It drives not only enrollment, but it drives program. And so we're the the discussion on on dollars is almost superolous at this point. It because we don't know what it is. It's kind of like saying I want a building, but it might do this, it might do that. we we really need to nail down great alignment and then that lets us get into the discussion with what enrollment what cohort size do you want to build to and then what what curriculum are you pulling in and Jason's group
034did a wonderful job on the um the educational program now we need to parse through that and get a grade alignment that we're going to design to right so for the focus of this meeting let's try to stay on grade alignment Again, that will determine all those costs. I agree, Jeeoff, they're important numbers to know. Um, but we do have to make a decision um or have the discussion to make that decision. Does anyone from the public want have anything they want to come up? Questions, comments? Actually, if I may. Yeah, if I may, just real quick, um, kind of what Jeff uh, sorry, Greg was alluding to, too. Um, getting the thoughts of the school committee, the school building committee, talking about financial and operations. the sort of step one talking to the staff
035results that you all just saw today on the screen. Again, important to know educationally what's going on with what folks want to see and I think most importantly the meeting tonight with getting public comments of what you all would like to see in your building too. Um so that's that's the third and probably most important final step. So uh just wanted to say that before you open it up to everybody. So thank you for for coming. Um, I was just wondering what we're planning to do when we have like the extra space with central offices or entirely offline buildings. So, like for example, uh, an administration isn't going to use a gymnasium. They're not going to use like an entire lunchroom and stuff like that. So, what are we planning to do with that extra
036space? Like, because that still has to be heated if I'm right. Right. So that would have yearly costs that are basically just disappearing into the ether as like administrative offices. Nobody's playing in the gym presumably, you know. Um I was just wondering what happens to that extra space. Sorry, I just can't hear. Okay, sorry. I'm wondering what's happening with um extra area in the central offices. So if a whole building has a central off it's dedicated to central offices, they're most likely not going to use the gymnasium or an entire lunchroom or most of the classes. Um so I'm just wondering what happens like with general heating costs um stuff like that that over time we just have those areas empty and I'm wondering are we going to utilize those areas if we're building more
037areas? Yeah, I'll take a shot at it. Thank you. From the point of view of a former town planner, you don't you don't ever go into a plan without answering that question. What you have in in Blackstone Millville is a little bit unique in that the towns own the two elementary schools. And so the discussion in Millville is pretty straightforward because every time you're looking to maximize the use of the building or not use it at all. There's there's no half use with that building that suits the district. And I know you sit on Millville. So when you're sitting there, you want to be very selfish from the point of view of the town. When you sit on the school building committee, you want to be very selfish from the point of view of the
038school building committee. So when I'm looking at this from a planning point of view, I said, "Let's maximize Millville. It's a nice little building. It really fits that age group. Maximize that and keep it in use." The Kennedy Maloney complex is more difficult to run as an elementary school. It's more difficult to administer. It doesn't have the situational security that Milville has. It has a major road on either side of it. So I'm looking to minimize that and that use. Plus, Milville owns it. So, if the rental agreement now, I don't know it personally, but it's probably a triple net where the district owns all the expenses of running it. And if I'm wrong, someone can correct me. Typically, what would happen is you would as you pick a direction, you would enter into a
039negotiation with the town of Milville and reverse that and either just rent some space or rent some space at something other than a triple net. And you Blackstone Blackstone, sorry. And so it becomes a um part of the negotiation that would take place between those people in the town and the district, but not the building committee. The building committee's responsibility is to identify all of the potential issues and make sure that the right people are addressing them. And so your point's well made. What are you going to do with this? Your question from your role in Millville would be if someone came to you and said, "We don't need the Millville school anymore. Do you need it back?" That would be that discussion. If it comes down and you pick a direction and you say,
040"Hey, you know, we we only need, you know, a quarter of the complex." Okay? Building committee should be saying to the school committee, "Go talk to Blackstone." And you're done. So, the question won't go away. I'm not shutting that question down because I'll keep bringing it back. I I've been on your side of the table for about a third of my career. And you don't want to ever saddle a town with a cost that you don't identify and so well well uh well well brought and let's keep it in front of us all. So just I have brought this up in several school committee meetings. I'm also on the board of selectment in Blackwood. I've talked to the town administrator and the chairwoman and chair now chairman of the board of selectment in Millville. And
041these are the conversations that we've had because it's going to be the operational costs are the operational costs Blackstone pays you know their share you know based on the agreement for the operations of Milville Elementary and vice versa Blackstone Milville and Black Milville pays a share. So that's the conversations with the school committee's had these conversations. Um I've talked to the administration in Blackstone and Milville for the potential use because it is a Blackstone building. But with that being said then there's got to be some negotiations because if that portion of the building is say used by Blackstone then Blackstone's paying for the utilities and and and things like that and and not the portions coming from Milville. So that's those are those would be conversations that that are are being had and will continue
042to be had and and theoretically mil Millville's annual cost could diminish and blast zones could increase. That's right. And so I have follow question. Um have you guys looked at potentially moving like central offices? Like I understand there's a limit and if we want to add more uh like rooms, we would pay out of pocket and the state necessarily wouldn't cover that. Um have you guys looked at actually moving those central offices into another building? So building a couple more rooms um and then getting rid of a whole another building and then you could have two buildings offline and have it three buildings in total being in use in the sol system. Excuse me. So it's it it has not has not come up. That's not to say that it can't. It's um it would
043be it would be looking at your indebted cost, your bonded cost over 20 or 30 years versus your annual cost of using a building that you own, right? And you would have to program out whatever central office needs. We don't see a lot of advantage and Mike and Christina can find on what they've seen. The districts that we've worked with that put central office at a high school um generally put it off in the back somewhere. It and it it you have people coming in for early childhood entry screening to the high school as opposed to a separate building that may have a age appropriate playground where someone can park their kid for a little while while they're waiting for a meeting. So there there are some some pieces that go with a central office
044and putting them we I think we see them more frequently at the elementary schools or or an older elementary school because they have those facilities. Most of the people that you're dealing with in person tend to be people bringing kids in to register them for school and whatnot. Um the high schools the their interaction with the public tends to be the school administration with parents. So certainly look at it the you know request of the building committee will look at anything you want. We've got you know I just want I heard you say Rachel would we look at a couple of there's a lot more than a couple of offices in central office just to consider because I know you mentioned a couple but we have quite a few. I just wanted to throw that
045out there. It would be quite a few and it probably would be a wing. So the other thing just to keep in mind on that is that this is the high school project. So, if we're talking about moving it to the high school, that would be one consideration, but doing renovations in other buildings or things of that, that's not part of the consideration right now. We're we're showing you potential options of if you did this at the high school, what are options that you could do outside of the high school, but that's not to say that that's all part of this pro project. It's part of the process and you need to understand that and that's part of your decision- making is how you know what what are the advantages of of this? Can we
046take the building offline? Can we, you know, be get better grade configurations than other schools? One of the things I see with districts oftentimes is, especially when we're doing a grade reconfiguration, is it's not necessarily just to benefit that building. It's to benefit all the buildings, all all the all the students in the district. You know, I I had a district that redistricted their middle schools from 6 to 8 to to 5 to 8. They wantedmies because of the age differences. But by doing that, they had six elementary schools that were all benefited because of that by doing one project. And just a reminder, it's I I want to make sure the pe the our folks in the back can hear everything. Just make sure everybody's speaking up nice and clearly because there's no mics
047that Thank you. I see a lot of you leaning in trying to just to follow up on this discussion. Um how much um space um do we have allocated for the central office function right now in your in your planning in the high school? I don't think there is. No, at the not at the high school. How much is there is there a number that we're using for Okay. Um well, sorry. Um, I know we had discussions about putting prek in the high school, but none of these have this suggestion anymore cuz you guys saw it was an advantage to put the prek in there so you could have that opportunity for the high schoolers to be able to, you know, like get that experience. Yeah, we still can do that. The question was about
048preschool and if we were going to put preschool it I understand. I I'm happy to repeat it so make sure everybody can hear. The question was uh there was some conversation from the school building committee to put preschool at the high school for opportunities like chapter 74 programs and and you know additional pathway uh early childhood pathway for the high school students. And Rachel was mentioning that in the configurations listed here, it's not on there. The reason you won't find it on there is because MSBA won't pay a penny for that. There's no reimbursement for that. So if that's something that we decide to do as a school building committee, then we can do that. Um, so just it it can come essentially can kind of come along later. MSBA is not going to reimburse
049for it anyways. So this is all these are entirely without any extra stuff. Yeah. Yeah. It's just the alignment. Yep. Does anyone else have anything ask? Come on up. Can you just come to the table so we can get you on the mic? I don't know the rules of engagement at all. Um, speak loud enough in in the configurations and this might not be be the appropriate form, but do we factor in the additional cost if you go with the 9 to 12 of bringing the AFM online? I would assume that's additional cost in in terms of staffing and the funding. So, I didn't know how much that factors in. I don't even know the cost of running a building, but it's just a piece that jumped out a little bit. Can I speak on
050that just? So, if we did that, we would need to go back to the four the four school model that we had prior to this year. So, we would need to bring back online a principal, a nurse, a head custodian, the whole bit. So that last year um we had 11 and a half there were 18 and 1 half positions total but 11 and a half of those were the uh layoffs were because we consolidated our buildings we would need to reinstate uh those positions if we were to do that. Okay. Yeah. Just because that would also then factor in those additional costs. That's right. And those are ongoing moving moving. Exactly. Yep. It's a great question. Thank you. Anyone else from the public? Okay, I'll make a motion to close public hearing. So moved.
051Second. A second by Mary. All in favor say I. Any opposed. All in favor? Okay. And we will move on. Um Chair Chairman Keith from the school committee. Um so we do have a full school committee uh with us this evening. Um, so this how this works. Typically the school committee votes first and then the then the school building committee. We do have it in our next next meeting at 6:00's agenda. But um I'll just I'll take a motion from any member of the school committee um on a great configuration for discussion or discussion beforehand. Jane. Okay. Um, so I move that um or I'll actually read um I move based on the school building committee review of all four grade configurations and the public well the community comments. There wasn't much public but that's
052okay. Um that we move forward with the selection of uh 7 through 12 grade configuration for the Blackstone Millville Regional High School building project. There's a motion made by Jane 7. Second. Second by Erin. Any further discussion from the school committee? So I the reason I went 7 to 12 is I agree with Vickiy's comments and Jason's comments about potentially taking a school offline and not having four school buildings that we need to staff and house. And and while I like 6 through 12, um those who were in our meeting last time, I understand that this the difference between six and 12 is too significant for many many people. Whether I agree or not. Thank you, Jane. Any further comments? I'll put a two because there's two groups of here. I'll I'll take a roll
053call vote um for the motion made by Jane, seconded by Erin for the configuration to be 7 through 12. Jane, yes. Carrie, yes. Aaron, yes. Chuck, yes. Matt, yes. Tara, yes. Tara, yes. And I'm a yes. It's unanimous. Back to you. And I will take a vote um from the school committee uh school building committee. Um, so if anyone would like to make a motion with a grade configuration that you prefer, do we need certain language? Should I read your motion? You can make if we want it to be the same. I make a motion based on the school building committee review of all four grade. This is not the same one. I make well I make a motion based on the school committee's review for grade convictions and the public comments received that we
054move forward with the selection of 7 through 12 for the Blackstone Milville High School building project. Okay. Motion by Mary. Is there a second? Second. Second by Peter. Any discussion? Okay. We'll do a roll call poll vote. Mary I. Peter. Hi. Uh, Jeff, I'm gonna abstain. Nay. Rachel, yes. Scott, yes. Tara, yes. Yes. Jeff, I'm sorry. Jason. Jill. Yes. Joe, yes. Chuck, yes. Erin, yes. Carrie, yes. Sarah, yes. Jane, yes. Jill, yes. Jennifer, yes. Okay, the eyes have it. I'll just say for those watching and those at home, the motion that was read, it says XX grade configuration. So there wasn't a pre-written grade configuration. It it the potential was several. So So to our architect and OPM, you have your marching orders. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much for your
055time today. But if you throw sixth grade in there, I'm not upset. Um, a motion to adjourn the school building. Oh, so second by Sarah. All in favor? Any opposed? Okay. School building committee is adjourned. And I will take a motion to adjourn the school committee meeting for the 5:00 meeting to return at 6:00. So move. Motion made by Matt. Second. Seconded by Tara. All those in favor signify by saying I. I. Okay. I'm not going to ask. Meeting adjourned. You're not going to even ask.