Above: On Friday, officials discussed new estimates for the Neary Building project (screenshot from meeting video)
I have updated information since the post I wrote on Saturday morning about the big Neary School Building project and the survey.
According to an email from Neary Building Committee Chair Jason Malinowski, updated financials have a rosier picture for the cost estimate. He referred to the cost for a new four grade school as at about mid $80M.
Malinowski wrote that they will be issuing a new survey.
This morning the Town posted a public invite on twitter, referring to tonight’s meeting referring to it as a public forum.
The committee could vote to push off a decision tonight to solicit more feedback first. But the agenda still shows the committee as voting tonight on which project version to submit to the state.
This morning, the Town posted to YouTube the video of the Finance Subcommittee’s meeting on updated financials. In the meeting, preliminary options were presented as:
- Addition/Renovation to convert Neary to 4 grade School — $81.1M for Town’s share of cost
- New Construction for 2 grade school — $64.7M for Town’s share of cost
- New Construction for 4 grade school — $84.7M for Town’s share of cost
The consultant’s caveat was that the projections are “a snapshot in time”.
The subheader to my August 10th story referred to figures posted in the August 6th survey (which is no longer available to read). That showed a range of possibilities that included about $60-80M and $85-105.
I don’t have time to watch the full meeting (and the transcript isn’t yet available). So, I can’t say yet how much higher than that the cost could go or if the above figures are now considered the reasonable worst case scenario.
Tonight’s meeting will include a presentation on the updated financials and projected tax impacts of pursuing projects. (Again, that meeting is tonight, August 12th, at 6:00 pm in the Public Safety Building and over zoom.)
For more details on the building project, see my prior posts.
