001in the basement. >> Good evening everyone. I know it's late, everyone's tired, so we'll try to be thorough and expeditious all at once. My name is Greg Sanjin with Peret Sanjin Architects. With me is Dan Veno, one of our associates, and uh we've been working on various plans and budgeting for the projects that the board has been contemplating. We are summarizing many of those things this evening. Some of which have already been presented. Some of which will be presented for the first time this evening. And ultimately the goal is to better understand which of these avenues the board wants to pursue to present a referendum to the community for some much needed improvement. By district background, the building is made up of multiple additions. The original being 1959 and then various additions that were added
002over time. The building is set up primarily with a prek to kindergarten wing uh down here. The elementary school migrates from this end of the building through the middle and then the middle school grades which are primarily seventh and eth are at the far end of the building. As a recap to 2024 referendum, these were the projects that were under um or were proposed as [clears throat] part of the referendum. Most of them were infrastructure related like the boiler, HVAC, etc. We have yard room renovation and in that proposal there was a storage addition in the back of the building next to the gym. The total referendum presented back then was just over $15 million. The state came back and told us that the district was eligible for $4.7 million in debt service aid, leaving
003just over $10 million as part of the local share. the approximately 14 million of that was considered eligible by the state. There were a few things that were not and ultimately just as a reminder the way debt service aid from the state is calculated they take what is considered an eligible project you get 34 cents on the dollar or 34% and that's what equals debt service aid. the district ultimately borrows the entire money and then the state pays you on an annual basis, both principal and interest. Since then, there's been a lot of activity. The referendum failed and the board obviously went into superintendent search mode. Um Ken was hired and ultimately upon his arrival, he also evaluated the building and its needs. He facilitated a variety of conversations both with the board. He had
004meetings with administrators, teachers, and even students, which we were included in. And he's been holding these community connection meetings since the middle of last year where he invited anyone from the community to come and just to talk about their perception of the building's needs. Ultimately, needs were identified and they were lumped into two categories, two buckets, two considerations, whatever you want to call it, each were mutually exclusive. The first one is infrastructure which is reminiscent of what was discussed in 2024 and the second is educational which we'll review further this evening. We just wanted to point out that the district has a strategic plan. That plan was put in place and it has three basic goals and those goals in many cases align with some of the things that we are working on now. That
005includes improving the educational environment and letting the students become better prepared for the next phase of their lives. So supporting student growth is number two. And then number three is the school and community values. Okay. Infrastructure projects. What we're calling consideration number one. By comparison, many of the infrastructure projects did carry through to the proposal that is being considered for this upcoming referendum. You can see them. and we lined them up so it was easy to follow. The couple of things that did get removed from consideration were the security vestibule and the new canopies and a few things were added including the burglar alarm, fire alarm and some uh lower gym what are the upper windows in the lower gym for replacement. The art room was also kept as a consideration under the other category
006and the storage addition was removed. The uh consideration [clears throat] which we will go over this evening is instead of an addition for storage, what kind of educational needs can we address because that was one of the things that we collectively heard as we were doing the planning and the presentations for the 2024 referendum. Just some imagery to put things in perspective. The roofs were in much need of attention and continue to leak. You can see the condition on the left and you can see the buckets on the right. Um because we couldn't wait and roofs did need to be addressed. Since the failed referendum and a few years before, approximately 53,000 square foot of roofs have already been replaced. That was at a cost of just over $2.4 million. Capital reserve or the district's
007savings account had to be used to pay for those. And just as to put things in perspective, because of the failed referendum, there was about $816,000 of money or aid that was lost because the roof is considered an eligible project. The other things that we're looking at are the heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems. The imagery on the screen from left to right are rooftop units, which you can see are antiquated, rusted, the boilers in the middle, which are um very old and have outlived their useful life. And then the unit ventilators which are typical uh individual pieces of equipment that fit in the classrooms that provide that fresh air and heating. The age of the equipment is about 25 to 30 years. The life expectancy of this equipment is 20 to 30 years. And
008the biggest challenge that is associated with this equipment, it's not if it's going to fail, it's when it's going to fail. And it's not if we can find parts, we can't find parts. And so as things start to get older and um outlive their useful life, equipment gets modernized like our phones. How many of you bought a new phone and all of a sudden the cord that charges it changes because it's a marketing ploy. And so equipment is no different. At some point they have to phase out the parts for equipment that is made 20, 30, 40 years ago because keeping it in stock just doesn't make financial sense. And so again, these are the kinds of systems that had a good run but need attention. Um so the financials associated with the infrastructure the
009uh list just as a reminder is on the left to this um proposal. The with the additional pieces the total infrastructure budget is just over $16.5 million. We expect debt service aid to come in at just over $5.5 million which again is about 34% of eligible projects. So the anticipated local share is $10.9 million. Okay. Any questions that we should address before we go on to the second consideration which are the educational projects as it relates to infrastructure. And I want to commend the board and the administration. I know that we've been working with you now for several months and I think you're extremely thorough. You've vetted all these things very well. You've pushed us to really help you make the good decisions. So, I want to commend you publicly because, you know, I think
010that shows that you are taking the responsibility of dealing with these much neededed issues very seriously while trying to recognize and maximizing what the community can do uh financially and benefit from from the state while getting these things done. Any questions? I have a question. Um, so you showed those rooftop units and the family. Let's say theoretically we cannot do and and they sort of written down. Would you replace them peace meal or do you have to do the whole thing? >> No, you could replace them peace meal, but it's very expensive. You lose downtime in a classroom because a classroom has to have fresh air ventilation when it's occupied and you don't get the benefit of debt servicing. But the the individual pieces unit ventilators the beauty of those systems are that they are
011independent pieces. That's why they can be thermostatically controlled by themselves. And so when a teacher is in a space recognizing that you're going to have different exposures north, south, east, and west, but the direct answer to your question is yes, they can be replaced individually. Any other questions? I don't know if we want to open it to the public at this point or at the end or >> probably that's fast. >> Okay. Moving on. >> Consideration number two [clears throat] which is exclusive of consideration number one. This is the educational piece. So the needs that were identified were classrooms that are being shared in some cases by two or three teachers. windowless spaces that over time have been converted from storage to educational and the fact that project uh projected enrollment will continue to be
012an issue. The area is an attractive one to move into. There are older families that are moving out and so what can be done to address those? The other educational issues that were identified were some of the specialized instructional spaces. That includes a music space that again is now occupying a space that was originally designed as a windowless space and was used for gym storage and the adjacent space which is also excuse me the art room. And then the next one which it the STEM lab which and the next one we don't have a picture of the smaller one. Oh, we don't picture small. Okay. So >> so small it didn't fit. >> Yeah. So, there's another smaller [laughter] music space next to the big music space. Um, but then the art room, which has
013been on since day one to modernize it. Right now, we have um sinks and things that are not for the height of the that don't accommodate the taller students because it's a K through 7 8th grade class space and doesn't address the smaller students. So giving it uh improving it from all aspects within the current shell and also potentially addressing the need of what is a converted classroom into the ever evolving world of STEM. So just as a recap, [clears throat] the goals educationally identified was eliminating shared spaces, addressing the special education needs and getting people out of windowless spaces, improving the specialized instructional spaces, music, art, and STEM, including um at the the original goal was trying to find some flexible educational multi-purpose room space, repurposing some professional spaces. So, for example, when we
014would pull out some of the child study team or the director of special services or speech out of these rooms, repurposing those into storage or into a conference room or something that doesn't allow or doesn't um isn't used for students and for staff. Okay, so we presented this before, but just as a recap, this is an aerial view of the existing site. It's probably somewhat familiar, although maybe not many of you have seen it from this vantage point. And the property has a lot of environmental considerations. The dashed uh lines represent setbacks and buffers, while the shaded areas represent an environmentally sensitive area. In this case, a wet land or something called the repairarian zone based on the ponds and the waterways that surround the property. So technically as you can see um over time
015these become more sensitive in nature and based on some of these limitations there's not a lot of opportunity to expand the footprint of the building. However one of the first exercises that we went through with the district was to look at what could we do if we really want to maximize the opportunity. what could we do to get the footprint expanded and accommodate some or all of our goals? So, what we were able to do is by expanding toward the front of the building over the parking lot, we were able to research have a what they call a pre um [clears throat] a pre-application meeting with the Department of Environmental Protection. And what we were told is that this concept could work with what are called general permits and no special requirements. Specifically constructing 10,000
016square ft over the existing parking lot. Moving the parking lot formally to the front even though people park there today. Making that formal parking spaces. And even though we are in some of the transition area limits on both of those, because these areas were previously disturbed, we get to work through a variety of general permits down at the D. We do need to have sensitivity to a couple of pin oaks that exist in your front, which are the homes for the Indiana bat and a host of other creatures that I'm sure. But the DP was happy to see that we were paying attention to that and insisted that those not get disrupted. So at this point what we did in conjunction with the board was we said okay this is what we could do it's
017something that we can accommodate fairly reasonably by expanding the footprint of the building. So what we did was we took the program that was shared before with the ideal educational needs and then we developed the plan and then we looked at two other options. So what we're going to present this evening is kind of a big middle small version which addresses the educational needs to different degrees and the budgets as you can appreciate are different as well and the goal would be for the board to give some thought to which one they're comfortable presenting to the community and then for us to submit that to the department of education with the infrastructure projects which I think we're generally already aligned with. Okay. So concept A is a full 10,000T addition with the relocation of the
018parking and the interior renovations. It would look something like this. The orange area represents the new construction. The new construction would have a science steam space in the front classrooms and small groupoup instruction wing facing the softball field. And the question came up, well, if we're building this and we're trying to get rid of windowless spaces, what is being proposed here is that the band and coral room and art room, which are in that center core, would have a higher roof with clear story windows. Those are really conducive to these kinds of spaces because you get the benefit of natural light, but you don't have the concern about direct sunlight impacting things like the storage of instruments that don't do well in direct sunlight. The um art room, storage, and kiln areas are in blue
019because that would be a renovated space. And then what you see along the existing building are a variety of renovations that we're taking the shared spaces and we're dividing people up so that all the small group instructional spaces have their own space. They are windowed and then the existing spaces that we were looking at turn into either storage, conference rooms or things that are not occupied all day. There are 2 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 small group instructional spaces. The main office moves from here down to the area that the business office is currently so that anyone that is coming to the building can access the main office more directly because while it was down there where the building was originally built, over time it moved down here and that's been one of
020the constant concerns which is that no one really knows where the main entrance is. Okay, next slide. Um, this concept budgets out at about $17.2 million. Any of the new construction would not be eligible for debt service aid, but we do believe we might be able to get some debt service aid for the interior renovations. And this would be exclusive of the last consideration, which would be $16 million for the infrastructure. And again, so the anticipated local share right now would be 17.2, too, but we think that will come down a little bit and that we might get some debt service aid for the project. I will talk about how debt service aid is calculated and when we will get that in the next uh couple of slides. Concept B, which is now our medium
021version, is just over 7,000 ft² and an addition with interior renovations. In this case, there was a lot of conversation about going towards the softball field and what happens to the softball field. And my understanding is that there have conversations have started with the town about what that might look like. But on paper, these things are easy to explore. And so that's what we did. So here what we did was we did lose some of the program. So for example, the main office isn't moving, but we did get everyone out of windowless spaces. We were able to accommodate the classrooms up in the far right. They would go out towards the softball field. So the softball field would essentially be unusable in its current form and would just turn into open area for play. And
022then we converted the existing science room into a larger STEM flex space. We built a music room off the upper gym so that the common areas are still centrally located for everyone across the board to use. The art room would stay renovated as part of the original uh infrastructure proposal. And again, this meets the basic educational goals. We are saving quite a bit of money because we don't have to relocate the parking lot based on the addition that takes place and we are reducing the square footage that has to be constructed. This one comes in at approximately $10 million. The debt service aid is the same as the last one where we don't expect to get anything for the new construction. you don't have something called unhoused students currently and we do expect that we
023might get something for the interior renovation which will be determined uh when we make that submission to the state and again this will be exclusive of the $16 million infrastructure projects that we discussed earlier. And then the last of the concepts was the request to look at what is the minimum amount the superintendent could live with from an educational perspective to balance the big medium and small considerations. So in this case, the proposal, and this could arguably go to the softball side, but in this case, we just chose to show it in this area and let the softball field stay on its own. What we essentially did was by removing people from some of the shared spaces within the building, we were able to incorporate small group instructional spaces there and regain classrooms in the
024building. We did get people out most of the people out of the windowless spaces where students are being taught on a daily basis and ultimately the music and art room spaces would stay where they are. And then we would do some renovations to accommodate the simplistic goal of removing any student that is in a windowless space as part of this smallest program. This one comes in at just over $5 million. Again, the debt service aid calculation would be the same. Nothing for new construction, maybe something for interior renovation. So, the next steps for the board educationally decide if the board wants to present to the community concept A education, concept B education, or concept C education. You're not deciding to build it because that is to the voters. All you're deciding is what do we
025submit to the state to get back the preliminary eligible cost letters and what do we present to the community to decide on and that looks like one of these options. We made the presumption based on our conversations that the infrastructures are the baseline because that's if not a when. So if we took option one it would be the 16.6 $.6 million infrastructure project with debt service aid plus a concept A of $17 million. You would be presenting one or two questions. That's still up to be discussed and doesn't have to be decided immediately, but you would be presenting to the community just over a $33 million referendum. Option two would be to take those same infrastructure projects with concept B and present to the community $26 million referendum or take option three which are the
026infrastructure projects and a $5 million concept for a total of just over $21 million in total referendum package. And again, the decisions of one question or two questions, those don't have to be decided right away. We have to submit to the state. We get preliminary eligible cost letters, final eligible cost letters and then those decisions have to be made with financial adviser and the bond council. Some frequently asked questions. The first is okay you showed us the total referendum but how does it impact me as a community member? And ultimately, the tax impact on an individual homeowner is going to be calculated upon receipt of the preliminary eligible cost letter from the state. That typically comes about 3 months after we submit and is going to be received before the voters go into the booth
027to decide. So, everyone will know the financial ramifications before they vote. Ultimately, the PEC is a formal response from the state that tells you exactly how much they're going to contribute to the project. And with that information in hand, the financial adviser and the bond council can more accurately calculate the average home and what that tax impact would be depending on which of those options the board decides to move forward with. We get this question a lot. Why does this cost so much? I can renovate my kitchen for far less. And the answers are that even the cost of our own home renovations have gone up significantly. But the primary driving force are prevailing wage which is the equivalent of union rates and other state mandates. These are things that are required in public projects.
028And so the cost to construct is just higher. Why do I have to vote? The voting is required for the board of education to borrow money long term. So ultimately the community has a chance to vote like they did in the last referendum because the improvements that are being proposed have a 20 25 30-year life expectancy. And so the the benefit is that by borrowing that money for that same period of time that the equipment and the improvements have a life expectancy. You're sharing that expense with future residents of the community where the capital reserve account that was used for the roof that was paid in one year. you didn't have the benefit of debt service aid and you didn't have the benefit of paying for something over its life expectancy. So at the end
029of the day that's why people have to vote and the answer which I just provided having to do with capital reserve. Why don't we just keep using capital reserve? Capital reserve is a savings account. It can only be put away if there is extra money that is allocated to the capital reserve. It's limited. It can't always be funded to its maximum. Debt service aid is not available. And for the record, we all as New Jersey residents have contributed to other people's referendums, the debt service aid. So this would be nothing more than the township of getting their money back. The money you've contributed over the years, getting it back to assist you with your projects. And as I mentioned, capital reserve is paid in one year or you have the benefit of paying over 20
030years for some of these things. That concludes my presentation. I hope it wasn't too fast, but I'm happy to answer any questions or go back to any slide that you would like. the uh one thing thank you very uh the the slide on the options of the dollar amounts when we ask the voters to vote that's the number that's shown is prior to the DSA but assuming you get the exact number the 5.7 GSA does then the question then become that number minus 5.7 or you show the full gross number before the GSA >> so what you'll see when the bond council sits with you is you would have to borrow the full 33 million or the full 26 million or the full 21 million. >> And the debt service aid is given to you
031on an annual basis. >> Got it? >> So they're not going to state of New Jersey is not going to write you a check for $5 million. You're going to borrow the entire amount and then every year they pay you their share of what they committed to in the PEC and the FEC based on that amount. >> Got it. So the way that the questions are worded essentially assume there one question. Do you approve 33 us to borrow 33.87 million? There's no other qualifier in the question that says, "Hey, by the way, it's not 33, it's going to be 27." >> So that's a little above my pay grade. >> Something we have to communicate to the the >> So it will be incorporated into the the language of the question >> into the question
032as this. >> It'll it'll tell you that you're authorizing us to borrow the total column. However, we are we are getting the following debt service aid from the state. >> Yeah. >> Which reduces the local share. So, these are legal things that I don't know that I'm equipped to answer specifically, but your bond council will come to one of our meetings and he'll explain. He'll help you write the question. The question is written in such a way where, you know, normal lay people are not going to necessarily get it. >> Exactly. >> Um I know I don't. I walk into the voting booth and it's like what? Because they have to use all these legal ease to meet the statute. But the answer is you will be asking to borrow the entire amount and ultimately
033the state has committed to you their share on an annual basis which for the record covers principal and interest of the money you're borrowing >> and includes things like not only the hard costs that are eligible but the soft costs. So the permitting, the the professional fees, all the amounts that are eligible will get that debt service. >> And then uh follow this, if the projects come in under that amount, the difference is then essentially refunded back into the community as in we will take note, but the community will pay less in their tax than what they expected. Correct. Depending on what the difference is. So, if it come if it comes in at 30 million instead of 3387, it'll just be a spread across 20 years. But then, >> correct. >> Early on, you'll
034be borrowing the money depending on whether it's a short-term note and you're going to wait for the interest rate to drop or if the interest rates are good, you might borrow all the money. And you'll also gain some interest for the money that sits in the bank while you wait to finish the drawings and go out to bid. And typically what will happen in our experience is in the aggregate we have a consistent record of hitting the total referendum amount but markets change over the course of a couple years. So one project we budgeted might come in a little bit over what we budgeted but another project might come in a little bit under what we budgeted but in the aggregate we have an outstanding record of hitting the total. And if we don't use
035the entire amount of money then you don't have to use all the money that was borrowed and that gets refunded to the community members. Thank you. Um I have a question. Um I guess for any of the three options, but certainly for the media, I mean, do you have a a way to have deals without disrupting? >> Yeah. So, so >> I'm not going to say that none of this is going to disrupt the school and we have to be very conscious about it, but I'll give you an example of how in our experience we've been able to manage that. So, when the referendum is passed and we replace the unit ventilators in each of the classrooms, typically we will do that on second shift. And what that means is that we will work with
036the principal slash superintendent and we will say, "Okay, we need these two classrooms for a week." So, we'll have to find a place to put those teachers and students temporarily. They'll come in at night. They'll work for the week. They'll get the space ready to go back up and then we'll shift and move to the next two classrooms because many of these projects can't be done in a summer window. As for the additions, that will be something that will start during the school year, potentially in the summer, but it will absolutely go throughout the school year. So, we'll have to fence off areas. We'll have depending on which one is selected, we'll have to make sure that it's safe because contractors have to come and go. And typically, that will happen during normal business hours.
037But many times and we'll typically incorporate into our bid specifications if there's testing or if there's other things that we call blackout period where the contractor when he's bidding the project knows in his schedule he cannot work but you know putting up concrete block to build the new addition. It's not noisy. So there's not a real concern for total disruption. We would never do a roof over kids heads while they're occupying the space. the small group instructional spaces that we're dividing a classroom that can happen over a summer pretty quickly. So, those spaces will be good to go. So, we have a lot of tactics that go onto it, but you know, in all cander, there's going to be some disruption that happens because inevitably construction is not something that is easily controlled on a
038regular basis. There's always things that come up. And do you know like a I guess for for each one what's the time a year or two years? >> So ultimately our goal that we've been discussing is the fall which means a successful referendum. We still have drawings to do. So in the summer of 2027 we might be able to get some projects out to bid this time next year just so the community sees some things happening. But the drawings require time to get developed because the state wants a submission to the department of education that has enough information for them to review and give you an approval but not that are complete sets of drawing because they don't want you spending money on the professionals if the referendum is unsuccessful. So we still have work
039to do after the successful referendum to get the drawings done. So we expect that some smaller projects we can see in the first summer and then starting in the fall of 2027 we could start to see some of the other ones and we would sit down with the administration on the board. We develop a schedule. We might push some projects out so that not everything is happening at once because we want to manage the disruption so that it's not completely chaotic and so we'll have to develop those schedules so that those things are taken into consideration. I guess to build on that realistically like if you were to say I just choose option two when would that actually be done >> the additions? >> Yeah. Like if you were to say option two >> Yeah.
040I So I would say September of 28 is when you'd be occupying those new spaces >> would be. So we'd be basically done with all the stuff >> unless the board wanted to start occupying spaces earlier which most people don't like to cuz that's disruptive to the students. So, if I'm thinking through this, >> if fall of 26, >> it passes. We have a few projects in the summer of 27, we have our drawings developed and we're out to bid. That gives us a year to do the renovations and the new construction and be ready for plus or minus September 202. >> So, the fall of 27, you're starting to do stuff. Spring 28, summer of 28, hopefully then by September 28 that gets done. So they'll start having some stuff in 27 28 but
04128 29 that if this happens we would plan >> and we're going to and we're going to try to you know we're going to try to balance those things because you're going to have a lot of different contractor doing a lot of different things. >> Yeah sure. Okay that's helpful >> when you look at renovation cost of existing spaces that will be moved. Is there any equation or algorithm that you've previously worked with and other schools that you see coming back from the state and those funding or is it just kind of an unknown? So no one works in the state here, right? That was a question. So it was a question I forget to ask. Um technically >> So generally speaking, the state promotes the idea of renovation. They want people to upgrade their
042buildings, which is why they take our budget and don't question it and give you 34 cents on the dollar for an eligible project. Classrooms are typically very eligible for renovations. And in this case, because you have shared spaces, we think that's a great argument that we can make. Each reviewer is different and sometimes has their own interpretation just like any code official. Conversely, new additions because they are so disincentivized to fund those, they are using numbers that are unreasonable and are in statute. And that's why even if you are eligible for an addition, ultimately the value that they're willing to give you is so unreasonable that it's a nominal compared to a renovation. So the answer to your question is that there there are um there are guidelines that talk about what is eligible and
043we try to maximize those but it's the interpretation of the reviewer that really will determine whether for the interior renovations they're going to give us the money or not. Does that make sense? [clears throat] Any other questions from the board? I actually have a question for Mr. Patini. Um, just curious with the educational needs aspect of these different concepts, which one do you think better suits the long-term vision for the district? I have my personal thoughts, but I think it'd be important to hear what your thoughts are, too. >> Well, um, first of all, thank you very much. I really appreciate all the work and to the board for doing all the work behind the scenes. when I'm asked for the educational vision, the footprint or the campus can't encompass all the things that I
044have in my mind. So, I appreciate maximizing the space, but it seems that the maximum space here has a cost to it beyond financials. It's moving the parking lot, changing some of the the flow of the traffic and things of that nature. uh it just seems like that there is something else that we're going to have to deal with in that capacity u in the um in the building but it does it does achieve a lot frankly um and then I was asked for my minimal uh amount and I and I kind of view things in wants and needs but then warranted there are things that I think are very critical and they may be in the needs and warranted area for example windowless spaces there are some classrooms that or one classroom that the
045children in for the majority of the day that do not have windows in it. That to me is a priority over another windowless space where kids or teachers may be in and out of that during the course of the day. So then I had that priority. So my minimum standard frankly speaking the small standard would be such basic m um meeting the the most critical needs of of that like small portion of the needs and warranted area. So to me I think option two the the middle ground uh accomplishes a great deal. It gets people out of window spaces. It provides small group instruction and it also uh allocates space for those classrooms that are shared by two generated teachers. So it it kind of like cuts across all those sections >> and also the
046music >> and yes absolutely [laughter] the arts are very important to me as you so it handles a lot of that like I said it it goes across a lot of those scenarios >> you're welcome. >> Shall we open it up to the community? >> Sure. There's only five left. >> I actually was just wondering, can we see the slides again for option concept A and B? Like I was just I obviously we're going fast for time, but I was just curious like what we're losing between A and B. So concept A, we take the science room that is currently down in this end, which was a converted classroom, and we bring it up to here and combine it as a more integrated STEM lab. We gain back a general classroom down there. or what
047we discussed is that might get a 3D printer and a Lego so that the little kids have a starter STEM lab that they can use while the older middle school kids have something that's more in line with what they're going to see in high school robotics and things like that. And then this will also act based on the flexibility of the space for an opportunity for other meetings because the gyms are always full, this room is always full. And so we've tried to to figure out without building a space for meeting room, how do we accomplish that? The the music room gets taken back and I think that gets moved around to become either some meeting space, teachers areas or or something along those lines. We add some staff bathrooms and we create a band
048room and a coral room with higher ceiling and a footprint that meets the facility efficiency standards of the state of New Jersey. So the acoustics will be much better. Then on the other side of the wall which is down the ramp into the seventh and eighth grade classroom. These are uh content areas general classrooms um for the seventh eighth grade. So those get moved over to here as do some of the small group instructional spaces that we need. And then what you're seeing over here are people getting pulled out of those windowless spaces and the professional office main office getting moved up to here. >> Good. >> Gotcha. >> Okay. So concept B. concept B. The addition moves from here out to here. And so the parking lot is a pretty significant investment that is
049not needed now. And so similarly, we leave the art room alone. We build a music room up here. Now, this is just one room, not a separate band and coral storage, music storage. Um, and so we put that kind of in the noisy area where the gym is so that they don't bother one another. the content area and the existing space science room that is here gets expanded into a larger footprint. We have classrooms that are added and I think part of this plan, Dan, correct me if I'm wrong, is this starts to become a middle school wig. So, some of the sixth grade get pushed here and then the classrooms that we pick up. So, for example, I think this is room 34. That one gets divided because it's shared by three people. One
050comes up here, two get now divided, and then we do something similar over there. And then we pick up, for example, we pick this space up for storage or whatever else we need. So, we're still picking up most of the things leaving the art room, the main office and the professional child study team, those kinds of things are not centralized, which was one of the goals in the bigger plan because they interact so much with Ken on a daily basis. We're trying to bring them together. And so those are kind of the differences between the two. Big picture. >> Should be blue. >> Yes. >> What do you mean? So actually >> for this plan no because that's part of the >> but technically it's >> now my question about this is is there any
051additional clearance that has to happen with the environmental or is that that something that's just a matter of going through the process and it's not? >> Yeah. So this is a repairarian zone which is different than a wetland and what we've confirmed is that we can build up to 6,000 ft within the repairarian zone and not trigger any additional requirements. So we feel we're pretty comfortable up there. That's why this is limited to about 5,750 ft. The next number we have to worry about is 10,000 ft because that trigger triggers storm water management issues. So this one totals just under the total bringing us to 7250. We still arguably have a couple of thousand square feet which has dollars associated with it. So we're trying to balance the investment, still maintain the educational needs because
052the board was very clear. We really want to understand a big, medium, and small so we can make a conscious decision. Show the community that we vetted all these things and made the best balanced decision between meeting educational needs and asking for financial support. So this has a limitation which we've maximized. That has an additional limitation to not trigger storm water management. And it doesn't mean we couldn't do this at some future date, but we would just have to deal with storm water management triggers, which by the way, in February of this year became even more stringent with the D. So this kind of works out well for us to minimize that issue. Can you explain for the public what the storm water management might mean? >> Yeah, sure. That >> Yeah. Um, storm water
053management is basically you have properties that have imperous and pvious surfaces, meaning things like a building, a parking lot don't let water absorb into the ground. And so you need to manage those so that adjacent properties that are downhill don't flood. and you need to maintain water that's on your property today stays on your property and before it leaves doesn't cause issues for other people in adjacent properties. So, normally you can manage those two different ways. An underground retention or detention basin. Each is a little bit different, but now the DP requires above ground. And so, um I'm sure if you've driven around newer developments, you'll see this large depressed area with a pipe coming into with a fence around it and you wonder what what's that? Yeah, it's empty. Drive by it during a
054heavy rain and you'll know exactly what it was intended to do because it fills up like a pool. And if it didn't have a place to collect and drain naturally, everyone downhill would be complaining. And we've had those circumstances where in prior years, those circumstances were not addressed and then, you know, neighbors are are concerned. So that's what storm water management is. It's a big Department of Environmental Protection issue. And these kinds of things where you're building over grass areas start to trigger some of those things where building over parking lots don't. So that means you could go further out to the side. >> We could up to 6,000 square feet before we have other approvals that we would need. So we could get another 300 400 ft here. But we tried to minimize the
055approval process because the Department of Environmental Protection has these this menu of approvals. They're called general permits or permit by rule, which means we've already approved this a million times over the last 40 years. So if you can meet these guidelines, you don't have to come to us for a special approval. You use this general permit. Just show us that you're meeting the general permit requirements. If we deviate from that, we can still apply, but now we're talking about a custom permit, which could take a long time. So we tried to minimize the interaction with the D to something that is manageable and still accomplish the goals that were set forth. >> Um, can I ask your question or Sure. Um, is there a thought or plan in place of what we would do with
056our softball team if proposing concept B? >> Um, there's discussions about what could possibly happen. We're conversations about that. >> A nice field in RFL by the baseball team. >> I have a question about concept. Is there any concern? I I think it's hard to tell exactly. You're losing at least two or three entrances to the school as currently set because there's one a couple gyms. Anyway, we is there any I don't know if there's any issue or like even just like quality of life. Everyone's going through one main door and you know prescores lock down. I just want to any thought to like what are we doing to help? >> Yeah. So, so the answer is there's absolutely egress code requirements and the egress code requirements primarily deal with you have a population and
057you need to from each space calculate how they get out from a space. And so by way of example, if you look at your gym here, your gym has multiple entrances because it can hold a greater occupant load and therefore you need more doors. And I won't bore you with code requirements, but historically a 3-ft door can occess 150 people. So you can see that you have 150, 300, 600. So it's taken into consideration there. as it relates to these other ones. You can see this is a conceptual plan and post referendum we would push and pull some of these things in more detailed conversations about okay we meet all the egress requirements the building is safe but let's talk about how the kids come in right and so if we needed to change the
058configuration here we have that flexibility and we might reintroduce a door here or we might say well we're going to bring the kids down to this point and we're going to have them come in here and we leave this one alone and we have this main entrance and we have this door so think we need to push this down a little bit, put a door. So, we've calculated to make sure egress is met, but we don't want to go too far down the rabbit hole now because if this isn't selected, a b if the referendum is unsuccessful, then we're dealing with the nuances that we don't have to deal with. We have enough flexibility in the plan to push and pull and to talk about, okay, where do because we generally know the pre preschooler
059come in one entrance and the other ones come another entrance. So, we would look to match that again. And sometimes there's a traffic pattern that changes as a result of a new day. And so that would be something we would talk about extensively as part of the detailed post referendum. >> Okay. Hearing no other questions. I mean, is there like a ballpark for any of those options, those three options of what the tax might be for the community? >> I am not the financial guru. I am merely an architect. >> Like, this will raise you this much. This will raise you this much. >> And so, the financial advisor sent us some information that said, look, when we get the preliminary eligible cost letters, we can do a calculation. And I think what the board
060wants to do and and many boards do this is they don't want to share a number that isn't accurate because a if it's too low people get excited and then when the number come in it gets higher and they're like you know you did this intentionally and conversely if it's too high it turns people off and now all of a sudden the numbers lower and no one needed to panic. So I think the goal here is the board needs to look at this and say what are we comfortable presenting to the community and then once they get that preliminary eligible cost letter it'll be publicly have to be accepted and the financial adviser can be presenting. Okay, here's the average home in the township. Here's what these pieces will impact it and then you'll know
061that before you go into the voting. >> But they're only UA is only going to pick one thing to submit, right? >> Correct. We're not going to submit three >> proposal. I mean, I suppose we could submit three, but I don't think that is something that is typically done. I think I think the board has done a lot of vetting over the last several months and they are at the point I don't want to speak for them but that these are the options we've been asked to prepare and they have to decide as representatives of the community what do we think meets the educational need because we don't want to be shortsighted but we also want to present something that will pass so that we can move this along because obviously they heard very clearly
062when the last one failed Why do we need a storage room? We need educational space. >> Um, I just don't remember where I'm pulling this from because obviously you're saying we don't know the number yet, but I thought there was something where it was like for the average house for every 5 million in referendum it was 150 increase in taxes. >> Yeah. So, that was presented in our first presentation >> just to give an order of magnitude from the financial adviser. But now that these things have changed and we don't know the debt service aid on some of the interior renovations, this financial advisor suggested, look, that was a roundabout number just to say, you know, here's a lump number. It could go either way. >> And based on these kind of evolutions, they said,
063look, wait for the PEC's and then we can really do a much more accurate job of calculating that. So my my recollection was not to put everyone on the spot, but I'd like to put you on the spot because we have a lot to do. We were going to just after having presented the infrastructures a couple of meetings ago, see if anyone had any concerns about it, get us kind of the final sign off. We've already opened up the longrange facility plan. We've been editing that. Thank you, Mr. Murray, for getting us access to that. And we like to kind of continue populating those applications and then you are going to digest and have a dialogue about the educational options and at the next meeting provide us guidance so that we can get to the
064fall for the community. That was my recollection. Is that accurate? >> So do you need additional feedback from us for infrastru can you go to the infrastructure list? Yes. I would love to say after the various conversations of pulling and pushing the stuff from the infrastructure list, I think this meets what the intent of the board was. So if it is possible to get a thumbs up that yes, we authorize this, John can start putting resolutions together for the next meeting so that we can submit them with the applications cuz we've already started the process because we knew you know most of these if not all were no questions but you know there were a couple of questions that still resonated that I think were answered but I I don't know. So if we can
065get a an approval for these that would be ideal. I recognize but >> if you remember the board already authorized him to submit the application. So that part resolution already done but then he came back and tweaked it a little bit. So I think he just needs a thumbs up that >> what do you come with the change >> having a resolution. >> He already has the resolution to submit. >> Yeah. I just all I need is the board to say the infrastructure projects that are on this list total 16 million with an expected 5.6 million of debt service aid are the ones that we want to completely put in the application and present to the community and the educational project you're going to digest >> and pick one for the next meeting which is
066the 20 >> day you need that thumbs up right now. >> That would be the goal. That's what we talked to. You you already gave us the thumbs up conceptually for the project, but there were there were one or two questions like the lower gym window. >> If I could just he had a couple of questions. >> Yeah. >> And that's why he redid the side by side. >> Yeah. >> And provide a clarity there. >> Um and that's where we're at right now. This is a confirmation with that. >> Okay. I I'm I'm good with it. I just I didn't know if we need to make a resolution or something. off because you didn't answer. >> Yeah, that's what I'm curious. >> I just want to know can I can I populate the application
067that we're authorized to start with these projects so that when John and Ken get the and the board president gets the gets the applications assigned. No one's going to be surprised that it's going to be $16.6 million with this list of projects >> because I think before we had the resolution to submit it and then somebody had questions about the crosswalk. >> Correct. >> So those answered your questions. We we don't need pass. We just need to confirm that that >> you're satisfied with the crosswalk that he did. >> Are we good with this? >> We're good. >> And then next week it's just for the education. Okay. >> Yeah, I think there were some questions about the crosswalk. I think you got those answer. >> You already approved. >> Yeah, but you guys just
068wanted to digest >> some Got it. I got it. Yeah. >> We pulled some numbers out that we had talked about. >> Yeah. Yeah. We went line by line. >> Okay. >> Any other questions for me? >> Any questions for Dan? >> What do you need? >> Nothing. So basically it's consensus that he's >> for the for the education. What you need from us? >> You want me to leave this up? discussions. Keep the screen over. discussing >> everything remember What about >> I think this so also say >> to me I think it's I think it's foolish. I think if we're going to we might as well we might as well ask for nothing. Honestly, we might as well not go with a question if we're going to go. >> It still leaves windowless
069windowless classroom >> it doesn't solve it's a problem. So sort of a consensus that >> is dead. I know he gave you com by way of you also concur with that. >> Yes. >> That he sent you a note that no >> so I'll start here on the line if Mr. thinks B can get us to where we need data. That would be wrong. >> I would say that's the most palatable when you consider the jump in costs from previous iteration where we didn't have this level of addition and this meets all the the criteria and I think it'll be more financially responsible. >> Yeah, I'm I'm you guys. I think you know having a terrible parking lot and obviously usually you need here I'm pretty comfortable figuring that out. >> The other thing just
070to remind everybody is even though it's not blue here our nurs's room is covered under the infrastructure. So while it's not shaded that way here, it is also scoped. >> I might be over oversimplifying, but I look at the $7 million difference as a separated band course room and moving some of the administrative offices and getting some administrative toilet and parking lot. That's basically $7 million. >> Yeah. Are there more classrooms? >> Would there more? Are there How many more classrooms does A have versus B? Or is it pretty close? >> Um, can you show? >> I can. Yeah, show. >> But >> some of the sizes are different though, too. >> So, it's pretty close in the concept. What is not crystal clear because we wanted to simplify the presentation. >> When you gain
071back spaces here, as a result, you're picking up a general classroom that's not really shown. in your general classroom. So, we could do that exercise for you to give you a real count. Um, but I I would be >> misleading you if I told you the exact number. >> But you can probably count them on a half like a different >> Yeah. Yeah. You're not picking up a dozen more class, right? The STEM space here, which moves there. You're picking up a general. >> It's maybe two two to four maybe more. So two to four classrooms of some kind of size, administrative offices, abandoned courtroom that are separated in a parking lot that's 7 million. Like to me it's double the cost of what that almost double the cost of what right? And so to
072me it is just like you're not getting the bang for the buck for that. And just on paper and think about the cost to reconigure something as far as the boilers are concerned because I get that disrupting justice more. >> Yeah, >> I agree. >> We'll figure something out. >> Yeah, it is. >> John just wants me to address that, you know, we do create a separate band and coral room, which is pretty significant square footage. >> And B, >> so we create a music room, >> band or coral, >> but what do you do if they're both running simultaneously? I mean when these two are running simult like I don't really consider that much of a classroom. So I don't know if Coral is in there in there. Coral is in the bigger room
073and Van switches between the cafeteria where the lower gym back and forth and they're moving things around and they they do have class at the same time. >> Okay. So look I mean by way of example in this plan this space comes back to the district for something. >> We talked about storage because there is a storage. If if this if this music space right here is going to be instrumental music and music is h coral music and instrumental music is happening basically all day long every day. There's [clears throat] this this space is coral music. This little tiny space is the instrumental music space. That's one of the reasons why they could never meet as a whole band. They always have to go in here. This would be instrumental music. This would remain coral
074coral or maybe one of these or something over here. But >> this can't be bought at all. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> I know there's going to be devils in the details of how you guys are going to have to coordinate the programming, but I it feels like to me and I'll I'll build on on Grace's point. I feel like this gets a lot of the core educational needs here at like a very like palatable cost. I will just throw this out there because you're not decided this evening. You have till next week to do it. But I mean, this obviously is used for playground purposes, but maybe not as much as people think. I don't know. But we still have without triggering storm water management a little bit of square footage up here. If you
075wanted to add a coral room at 1,200 ft, you could still do that and still be significantly below the $17 million mark. >> Yeah. And what is the average cost per square foot? So you're probably Yeah, exactly. So you're probably a million dollars, >> another million and a half for something to fill. >> What other room? So we need a concept. It could be B square. >> Yeah, >> that's an interesting idea. If there's a there's a modular lever that if you [clears throat] say it's another million a half, you could get a whole room extended, but you're going to lose the playground area, which arguably I don't know how much that money is used. >> That's the project fit area. >> Well, that's the project fit area. >> So, it's not really like a
076general play area. So, I don't I don't know how often it's used or if it's used as part of the curriculum. >> It's it's used pretty often and then I would not want to disturb it. I mean what we're doing here now is we're really kind of like closing in on this space. >> Yeah. >> Well, super important for KU8. Like they need they need that space. Like it's add more over here. [laughter] >> My job is not to create turmoil but help you resolve your issues. >> We could take project fit because the soft field's going away and you could put project fit down here. But if you >> relocate but a programming thing where you now have like no project shouldn't be programmed here. Yeah, sorry. Small, >> but very close. [laughter] >>
077Yeah, you'll be fine. >> Yeah. Okay. >> But you also said we have more square footage we can utilize. >> Not a lot. >> I think this is like 5,750. So the first 250 here >> before we get to 6,000. >> You're going to use it up if you did something with coral over here. >> The D is going to come >> bats are going to Indiana. the downside if you trigger that is you have a fairy shooter >> fairy shrimp or Indian >> they had what >> we were just talking about how much I learned over the decades Indiana and I learned about fairy shrimp in Dville where the environment consult walked through and there's puddles of water that you would think twice about But this gets you innovation stem level. >> I think
078that the concept B is fantastic. Yeah, I think that we spent a lot of time in our committees looking at different and tossing things around and I think it we get the responsibility for the fiscal side and you know really trying to do the most amount of meeting the educational needs for the best deal quite frankly. I mean, it feels right to me. So, like I think it would be great to have another courtroom. >> I don't know if we want to have Greg look at that, but I think that this is a really >> Even without it, I would too. >> I think I think this is looking really good. >> Yeah. >> Look, for me, well, if you're going to submit it to the state, you'd want it to go there. >> Yeah.
079>> I mean, look, >> we can't just add it. >> You can't. We have to make that. Well, because you want to make sure the money is allocated >> as part of the application for the referendum vote. >> How much space do you need in addition to that? >> If that's a court, >> what do you mean >> square footage wise? >> It's about 1,200 ft. If you want to >> is that music, 1200 now? >> Correct. I believe so. >> Similar size box >> similar music. You just mirror [clears throat] that over. >> So the place where the sand is, you just move that play space over there. >> Correct. >> Certified playground mulch. And you would you have to be something you have to have to but I would >> I don't know
080I don't know what age uses them. >> So I would certainly consider as part of this if the younger kids are using the playground fit area that you have to throw a fence around here and I'll check with our engineer. I think that'll be okay to do. They can come out these classrooms to use it and then go back. Obviously again I don't know what age is using it but >> yeah. Isn't it for the older kids? Not to say that that's what we needed, but is it for >> it was originally it was a it was a a grant that was done and I think it was through Mars Memorial Hospital and the Ed Foundation paid for the installation of it. So it didn't cost anything. >> Um and it was almost like the
081old park courses where you go around you do different circuits. >> So and it was part supposed to be part of the curriculum. >> They don't necessarily use it the way it is. >> They hang on. It's how much things for them to play. >> Yeah. They're hanging out there. The young kids hang out there and they're fooling around on on the equipment. The older kids, they don't really use it as workouts. They they want to play sports. >> Or if the older kids use it, they're just using to congregate. >> They're lawyering. They're lawyering. >> The interest of it being almost 10 o'clock, we can vet some of this over the next few days and next week in committees. That's >> what we can do is I mean it won't take us anything to
082throw a box >> on there just to show what it would look like. Update the budget. Get that to John by week's end just so you guys have a few days to >> I'm going to jump to it. But it feels like we're going with B. Like it feels like that's the temperature >> B variation of B. >> Variation of B maybe >> B1 or B2. I honestly I even think about the B. >> Yes, I I agree. I want to think about that a little bit more. But I'm kind of like not A. Definitely not C. I would rather not go with anything at all. >> We can look at B1 versus B2. >> So what do you need from Greg? And then would you be able to make to bring it down to
083next Wednesday? >> I mean it's >> B2 >> because I don't need that. >> I mean you need we were to do I don't really need another box. I can picture the box. >> Yeah. >> I would need kind of like what's the number of change? >> We can do that. >> Yeah. and he might have missed but it sounds like it's 1,200 ft at 600 be a little bit more because the hallway will get extended just to get us in there >> but but look it we've come very far. >> Yeah. >> Again commend you for really trying to vent all these things at this late stage to put a box on there and give you an updated budget. Happy to do it. >> That was Greg's nice way of saying you're driving me
084crazy happy to bring happy. >> So here we'll get that. We'll get you updated budget and then you'll have B2 to look at. It sounds like the fact that it sounds like you're all honing in on B helps us tremendously because we'll even get a little bit of a jump start I think before the formal approval comes just to buy us some time with the state because the state's always backlog. So we want to meet the deadlines to get to them. But this was very very helpful and I appreciate it and we'll continue to talk with Ken and John on just the paperwork and formalities that we're going to need. And then no one board president, superintendent of VA, you guys aren't going anywhere in the next month. >> I don't know. >> Well, I
085we're going to need your signature at some point. >> A lot of them >> for the application. So, if someone is planning on going away, >> can you document? >> You're not allowed to. >> Here's the insanity. >> The state requires a wet signature, but then doesn't accept the original applications from us anymore. We have to scan them and send them to them. [laughter] >> No joke. Not a joke. >> I love it. >> Trust me, I know. >> We used to deliver them the originals [clears throat] down there. They We don't want that. >> You have to bring them down. >> Can you recap what we're going to do? >> So, recap. So, he's going to come back with >> B2. B2. B2. And then by the Wednesday, [clears throat] cuz I think if
086you go past that, you're going to start to lose the window. >> Yeah. Next week, the applications. >> We need B or B2. >> Submit to the state. >> To be or not to be. Yes. >> Okay. >> Great. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you.