Panel Recommendation:

If A School Must Close, Focus On Reed

By Eliza Hallabeck

Meeting for what members suggested may be the last time, the School Facilities Ad Hoc Committee voted on Monday, February 6, to recommend to the Board of Education that when and if the student population for the next school year allows, the school board begin studying the option of closing a school, with a focus on Reed Intermediate School.

For the last year, as committee members pointed out during the meeting, the group studied the option and challenges of closing a school, following a direction from the Board of Education. Committee members include school board members and members of the Legislative Council.

Other schools the committee determined could be the focus of closing are Newtown Middle School and Middle Gate Elementary School.

Investigating the issue, as Legislative Council member Kathy Fetchick said on Monday, included speaking to district principals to determine the number of classrooms in the district needed for a designated population.

Committee members also used projected population estimates created by Hyung Chung of H.C. Planning Consultants of Orange in 2010.

Ms Fetchick also pointed out during the meeting that the town has no process for closing a school.

“We’ve never downsized,” said Ms Fetchick. “We’ve only expanded.”

While Board of Education Chair Debbie Leidlein said closing an elementary school would have the least amount of educational impact, the committee agreed closing Reed Intermediate School would allow for the most projected savings annually if closed, roughly $3 million.

Ms Fetchick said the $3 million projection included losing the associated principal and assistant principal positions if Reed were closed, but that would be a staffing issue the school board would determine at the time.

Other considerations around closing a school, as the committee determined, would be the expected cost to reopen a school if closed.

Closing Hawley Elementary School, according to committee members, would be easiest strategically with the school in the center of town, but with Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) compliance exemptions grandfathered for the school now, those exemptions would no longer be valid if the school were closed. If the school district were faced with reopening Hawley later due to a surge in student enrollment, it would have to be brought up to ADA standards.

Middle Gate Elementary School, Superintendent of Schools Janet Robinson said, would be the easiest elementary school to reopen if needed. She asked the committee not to ignore the option of closing Middle Gate if any school would need to be closed.

After consulting with other local superintendents, Dr Robinson shared those responses with the committee. Dr Robinson learned other costs associated with closing a school could come from redistricting, recalculating transportation routes into longer routes, and more.

As the school district’s Director of Facilities Gino Faiella pointed out, extra costs connected to reopening a school would also be determined on how the closed building was used during the time it was not in use. “Mothballing” a school, he said, would be the most expensive option.

The committee also discussed having the town use a school if it were closed, either entirely or in part, for a space for senior citizens or for the Newtown Police Department.

By the end of the meeting, school board member Richard Gaines proposed that the committee recommend the school board begin the process of looking into closing a school, with a focus on Reed, when the following year’s budgeted student population is projected at 1,500 or below for prekindergarten through fourth grade. The committee will also recommend a new population projection be completed at that time. The committee voted unanimously on the motion.

According to the current projected enrollment numbers, the population in prekindergarten through fourth grade could hit 1,500 or below by 2015.

Depending on which school would be closed, multiple scenarios for distributing the grade levels were looked into by the committee, including moving fifth grade students to the elementary schools and sixth grade students to the middle school.