School expansion goes to the voters
$123 million project's fate will be decided Tuesday
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Tuesday is D-Day for the Riverhead School District's proposed $122.9 million expansion bond issue, as district voters go to the polls between 6 a.m. and 9 p.m. in the high school gym to decide its fate.
"This is essential for our students," Superintendent Diane Scricca said of the proposed expansion. "This isn't something above and beyond, this is just what we need. We're not doing any grand, glorious thing here,"
The nearly $123 million price tag would pay for expanding all of the district's buildings except the one on Roanoke Avenue, which would become a central administrative building. Officials say the classes there are too small and there is not enough land surrounding the building for an expansion.
The proposal does not include any new buildings. In addition to expansion, it calls for realigning grades so that the elementary school buildings at Aquebogue, Riley Avenue and Phillips Avenue would become K-5 schools instead of the current K-4 designation. Pulaski Street, which currently houses grades 5-6, would become a K-5 school, and the middle school, which is now grades 7-8, would become a 6-8 school.
Dr. Scricca said research indicates that minimizing building changes is best for students.
A total of 53 new classrooms are proposed districtwide. The 25 classrooms currently housed in portable facilities will be phased out, officials said. The only portables the district plans to keep are the eight newest ones at the high school. They would be used for the Star Academy, formerly known as the alternative school. New music rooms are planned for all the schools, as well as 10 new science labs for the high school and a new gym for the middle school.
"This is infrastructure work that we've been putting off for years," Dr. Scricca said. "We can't put it off any more," Some of the proposed work involves safety issues that the district will be required to address, she said. Some of the windows at the high school have been in place since 1971, when the building first opened. The windows are not energy efficient and therefore cost the district money, Dr. Scricca said.
The proposal also calls for the installation of solar panels on the high school and middle school roofs. Officials say the panels will generate enough electricity to save the district $23,000 a year in utility costs.
Improvements to the district's athletic fields are also called for as is demolishing the current administrative offices in order to create four more fields. The football field would be relocated from Osborn Avenue to a spot adjacent to the high school track. The plan calls for building an artificial turf field between the track and the parking lot, with 1,200 seat bleachers, a new press box and a new concession stand. Two new tennis courts at the high school also are proposed, as is resurfacing for the track.
The cost to reconfigure the main campus fields and build the new facilities will total just over $7 million, officials said.
The bond also includes $2.3 million for renovations to the district's bus garage.
The project has met with some opposition for the sheer size of the bond.
Laurie Downs, a former Parent Teacher Organization president, said several local elected officials have publicly criticized the bond as too big, given the state of the economy, and she said she could not support it either.
"Although I believe there are projects within this big project that we need; the project as a whole, we cannot afford," she said.
Dr. Scricca said the $122.9 million price is not all that high, considering the district's operating budget is $105 million.
"We have students in basements that flood," she said. "We have classes all going on in the same area at the same time, where they can hear what's going on in the other class.
"We have to do something."
The district plans to borrow the money in four phases, with the bond being repaid over a 23-year period. The district has released figures claiming the average cost of the bond for homeowners is $204 per year at a projected interest rate of five percent.
Noah Nadelson, a financial advisor to the district, said at a school board meeting last week that there's no way to be certain what interest rates will be in effect in the future, although he feels they will not exceed five percent.
tgannon@timesreview.com
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1 comments found
Higher Taxes : 2/5/2010
Higher taxes? just what we all need in this ghost town.
I'd take a broken down school over bloated teachers pay any day. Get rid of the multiple do-nothing, over-lap administrators who earn $100,000 plus a year and put that money towards improvements. A quality education begins with quality teachers, (and we have a few), not some new structures. Some of the most sought after educational structures are over 100 years old and they are beautiful because they've been maintained properly. Fire this maintenance department for their ineptness at maintaining our school buildings and grounds.Student population is dwindling as I speak. You want to raise my property taxes so you can all feel good in a new school, I think not. Any fool who votes for this expansion has rocks in their head for brains and I'd like to sale them some swamp land in Louisiana. Get real people. We don't live in Pleasant ville. We live in a crime ridden, high taxed, nepotistic, behind closed door dealing town/school board fiasco ghost township. These crooks who tout that our children educational needs aren't being met, are the same ones using our children as shields to hide behind, to pilfer our pockets and bank accounts. Wake the F@#$^%&%* UP.
