Submitted by Stephen Selbst, Democratic member of the Greenwich Board of Estimate and Taxation
The 2024 budget adopted by the Republican-controlled Board of Estimate and Taxation (BET) is an insult to the community because it fails our schools. For Central Middle School (CMS) and Old Greenwich School (OGS), BET Republicans imposed arbitrary and unrealistic caps on spending, ensuring that neither project can begin construction in 2024.
Here’s how that happened.
Central Middle School
When the BET began planning in 2022 for a new Central Middle School, they needed an estimate of how much it would cost. The estimate provided at that time, $67.2 million, was not made by a building professional and at best, was an educated guess, because the Board of Education (BOE) had not yet developed its plans for the project. The estimate was for a new school of approximately 100,000 square feet and a cost of $600/sq. ft.
In 2022, the Board of Education developed its requirements for the project (called “ed specs”) and a building committee was formed. The building committee asked for $85 million for a building of 135,000 square feet to meet the BOE’s ed specs. That cost was in line with recent Connecticut new school construction, which has averaged $725 per square foot.
First Selectman Fred Camillo’s proposed FY 2024 budget included $75.2 million for CMS, which he called a compromise between $67.2 million and $85 million.
In a 7-6 party-line vote, Republican BET members refused to acknowledge the revised numbers. Imagine having to lead a building project for something as important as a school, and discovering partners won’t budge from the first estimate you received, one developed before any planning work had commenced.
Who does that?
BET Republicans rejected the school that the Board of Ed requested and ordered that it be downsized to match the original estimate. To accomplish that, CMS will have to be cut by about a third.
What’s more, they have jeopardized the start time of construction. To qualify for state reimbursement, the CMS building committee must submit an application to the Connecticut Department of Education by June 30. It will be very difficult to produce and approve a whole new plan by that deadline, which inevitably means another year of delay to 2025. With that single tie-breaking vote, BET Republicans dashed the hopes of parents in the community, and told us that they, and not the Board of Education, know what the community’s educational infrastructure needs are.
Old Greenwich School
For OGS, BET Republicans again hewed to an outdated and unrealistic budget of $24.5 million for a major renovation project. They also blocked funding to allow construction to begin in 2024, even though the OGS building committee made clear that they are ready to meet the June 30 deadline to file an application for state reimbursement.
OGS has been a construction priority for the BOE since 2018. First built in 1902, it has inadequate security, is not ADA compliant, lacks adequate classroom space, faces sewage backup during storms, and needs to upgrade HVAC and mechanical systems.
In 2020, the BOE estimated the cost at $24.5 million. But that estimate was developed before the Covid pandemic, which sharply escalated construction costs. When costs were updated in late 2022, Republicans on the BET balked and insisted the BOE instead look into tearing the school down and building a new one from scratch.
This is not what the community wants and it’s a red herring, another ruse to delay starting construction. Building a new school from scratch would require new ed specs, a time-consuming and costly process. It would also require demolishing the existing structure and raising the site because OGS sits in a partial flood plain, and would require finding and paying for temporary classroom space or busing children elsewhere while the new school is built.
During the budget approval process, BET Democrats proposed fully funding OGS construction for FY 2024 if the Central Middle School project was not ready for state funding this year. But BET Republicans refused to even consider that alternative.
Instead of funding the OGS project, BET Republicans allocated $1 million for a new elevator, which they said addressed ADA compliance, and $500,000 to fix the sewage problem. Those gestures are putting lipstick on a pig: neither adequately solves the real problem.
Moreover, they’re a cynical ploy to make it look like they’re doing something this year, when in reality they aren’t. BET Republicans know that lead times for new commercial elevators are 24-30 months. The new elevator can’t be installed now. It has to become part of the OGS renovation, as it always was intended. Further, BET Republicans were told that the elevator, while important, fails to bring the school into ADA compliance because it does not address the entrances, bathrooms, and classrooms which are not accessible.
The $500,000 allocated for the sewage backup problem is also an empty gesture; it was a number drawn out of thin air, without any explanation of what it pays for.
It didn’t have to be this way
So neither CMS nor OGS will begin construction in 2024. It didn’t have to be that way. The FY 2024 budget could have accommodated both projects this year. Moreover, given that BET Republicans knew CMS couldn’t break ground this year once they passed a pared down budget that required a whole new set of plans, they certainly could have greenlighted OGS. Instead, frustrated parents and the community will have to fight once more for a better budget next year.