News

Springfield voters reject school bond proposal

By Patrick Adrian
[email protected]
SPRINGFIELD, Vt. — Some Springfield School Board members say they will not pursue another bond vote in March for major energy upgrades following the proposal’s failure to pass by a ballot vote this week.

In a special school vote on Tuesday, Springfield voters rejected a $9 million bond proposal — 417 for, 458 against — to fund a number of major energy upgrades in Springfield’s school buildings, particularly in the high school and middle school which continue to operate using outmoded systems.

Just over 11% of registered town voters, voting either in-person or absentee ballot, participated in Tuesday’s vote.

Superintendent Zach McLaughlin said the result of Tuesday’s vote was disappointing.

“The items that were part of the bond were real needs,” McLaughlin told the Eagle Times. “The project consisted of a combination of efficiency and safety improvements. If we were to pursue these projects in a more spread out way, they likely will be less effective in terms of overall efficiency and more expensive in up-front cost.”

The proposed project, with an estimated cost of $10.4 million, aimed to address an array of energy inefficiencies within the Springfield High School and Riverside Middle School, both of which continue to use heating systems built in the 1960s and that have grown increasingly unreliable in their ability to control temperature or provide adequate warmth to students and faculty.

In addition to converting the middle and high schools from oil-heating to more energy-efficient propane boilers, the project included replacing cracked or old window panes, upgrading temperature controls and electrical systems; improving building insulation and ventilation; installing LED lighting in all the schools; and purchasing a new wood-chip boiler for Elm Hill Elementary School.

McLaughlin said it could be difficult to isolate a particular reason for why the proposal failed, particularly amid the ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic.

“Lots of different factors go into votes,” the superintendent said. “It can be hard to distinguish how much of this is a general perception of the value of the project, voter expression of some other displeasure or fear surrounding the health and financial challenges presented by COVID.” School Board member Steve Karaffa told the Eagle Times that he does not support posing the question again on Town Meeting Day in March.

“The taxpayers have spoken and we have to respect their decision,” Karaffa said. “I was elected to look out for the taxpayers and have always done my best to support that.

Karaffa also said that two other board members told Karaffa they do not support asking voters again in March.

The board opted to pose the bond request in hope to begin renovations by the start of summer vacation and, perhaps more importantly, to take advantage of favorably low interest rates.

Currently the interest rate is 2.17% for a 20-year bond. To illustrate the potential in savings, the last time the Springfield School District took out a bond, in 2009, the interest rate was 4.2%.

The difference between those rates equates to a savings of $2 million, according to Springfield School Board Chair Troy Palmer in an informational video about the project.

The district had planned to fund the remaining $1.4 million in project cost using $1.35 million from the district’s capital reserves and $45,000 in Efficiency Vermont tax credits.

The last time the school district took out a bond, in 2009, the interest rate

The district would have funded the project’s remaining cost using $1.35 million from its capital reserves and $45,000 in Efficiency Vermont tax credits. Additionally the district projected the upgrades to save $246,000 annually in operating and energy costs.

The bond would have carried a tax impact of 1.6 cents per $100 of assessed property value, equivalent to about $18.97 per year on $130,000 property.

The district, which warned the vote at the beginning of November, used a multitude of initiatives to engage and educate voters, including an informational mailer, two public meetings — both of which were recorded for online streaming — and a 12 minute video presentation in which building principals, McLaughlin, board members and district Maintenance Supervisor Tim Bixby overviewed central building problems and explained the benefits to addressing these upgrades now.

McLaughlin said the district will need to assess the overall communication strategy, including the challenges posed by pandemic restrictions.

“We can always do more,” he said. “In this case, we mailed information to every voter, held multiple information sessions on multiple media platforms, and developed a video to help explain the project. Meanwhile, we continue to struggle to have both virtual and in-person participation in our information nights. We need to continue to explore the reasons behind this.”

While these upgrades are still necessary, Karaffa said he will recommend funding the projects over time using the district’s capital reserve fund, which currently holds over $1 million.

Depending on how much the present or future boards wish to invest in upgrades, the capital reserve would need to be replenished annually if used to fund the project in similar scope.

By funding through capital reserves taxpayers could forgo the additional interest costs of bonding and arguably have more to year-to-year input if the project became piecemealed.

But as McLaughlin stated in the video presentation to voters, piecemealing projects is not the best approach to planning long-term.

“We want to be thoughtful and have everything work together in a cohesive way,” McLaughlin said. “And that only happens when you do large-scale projects all at the same time with a lot of thought behind them.”

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