The large price tag on two potential school bonding projects gave pause to First Selectman Toni Boucher, who stated she thought the town might not be amenable to funding such large items all at once.
On Monday, Mar. 2, the Board of Selectmen heard a presentation from Wilton Capital Planning Committee Chair Jeff Rutishauser on the priority selection list the group had made for renovation and repair projects related to the school and town needs assessment reports.
Last month the WCPC, through a vote of its members, prioritized 14 projects in order to make a recommendation to the BOS on what it should bond next.
“There’s a fairly good consensus among the members of what’s more important, what’s medium important, and what’s less important,” Rutishauser said, “so that gives it some validity.”
The top three items all center on Cider Mill School, including $2,900,000 for roof replacement; $955,030 for site work, doors and windows; and $2,701,268 for exterior envelope renovation.
Item four was $13,436,569 for continued school improvements at Middlebrook School, while item five was $8,689,594 for site work, doors and windows at Middlebrook, for a subtotal of $28.5 million for the first five items combined.
In particular, Boucher raised questions about the two Middlebrook items, which she said were going to raise red flags from residents because of the large amounts.
“I have some questions,” she said. “Obviously the $13 million for Middlebrook School continued school improvements, and the $8 million. They can be one item alone in any given year.”
“Instead of the entire amount, I mean can we continue to work and do some of the projects at Middlebrook without spending $13 million? … Can some of that, certain items in there, be bondable items we can have this year?” she said.
Rutishauser said that the approval for large sums meant that they could stagger the work over several years, but there would then be no reason to keep returning to the Annual Town Meeting for approval of the bonding.
He said that the $13.4-million figure centered on interior work at the school, while the $8.7 million was primarily exterior work at Middlebrook.
“It does not all need to be issued bonds that year … They will be staged as construction-needed,” he said.
Boucher was skeptical.
“It still seems to me to be an awfully big number to present in one year for approval,” she said.
“I can see your logic,” Boucher said, “but I still have a concern that the public will not really understand that. It’s kind of a staggering number …
“You’re talking about really $22 million worth of bonding to be approved all at once,” she said. “That’s usually reserved for a new building or some big structure. It makes me pause.”
Second Selectman Ross Tartell noted it was a balancing act.
“I get approving $13 million at once and staging it over time,” he said. “The question is, How do you present that to the citizens so they understand that they’re not going to get hit with $13 million of bonding on projects in one year?”
Selectman Matt Raimondi said there was a larger question relating to the board’s bond issuance plan.
“Depending on when we issue bonds, if we do it in June, it’a a very different story than if we do it in July,” he said. “So depending on when that happens, that’s going to determine how much we’re going to bond next year.”
He said that he would recommend making the proposal to the town while at the same time putting plans in place to draw down the outstanding bonds.
“I can see your logic,” Boucher said, “but I still have a concern that the public will not really understand that. It’s kind of a staggering number. It’s enough to build an entire new police station, for example… If it was in smaller increments, I don’t think we’d run into a problem.”
Raimondi, who shared agreement with Boucher’s concerns, said there was also the possibility of extricating certain items from those larger numbers and bonding them separately.
Tartell directly asked Raimondi, who previously served as chair of the Board of Finance, what his thinking would be from a BOF standpoint.
Raimondi said that the BOF will likely put the project costs into a bonding model — something currently being hashed out on the newly formed Bonding Committee.
“It’s hard to say what that bond model will show, because it’s all dependent on how much debt we issue this year,” he said. “I’m not being cagey. It’s a massive difference. It’s either $2 million of bonding to grow the debt service a little bit, or it could be $10 million of bonding. It really depends on what the issuance schedule is — but that’s the range, by the way — two to 10.”
Rutishauser maintained that it was better to ask for more, citing large projects on other schools in the past, otherwise people he said begin to lose sight of the work.
“It’s easier to get the authorization upfront like we’ve done in previous schools and then issue the bonds over the years, [otherwise] you run into that risk, that people get fatigued, that this is the fifth time we’re asking for bonds for Middlebrook,” he said.
“You have to balance that, pitching it at once with phased bonds and work, rather than chopping it up in pieces,” Rutishauser said.
The selectmen said they would consider discussing their options for choosing bonding items to put forward for the FY 2027 Annual Town Meeting (which will be held on Tuesday, May 5 at 7 p.m. in the Clune Center Auditorium..