High Cost Of Education In A College Town

Wildwood Elementary School

One important aspects of the major shake up proposed by school officials in the bricks and mortar make up of public education in our highly educated town is financial.  A burden of course that falls on the taxpayers, which includes ALL residents -- not just homeowners.

For instance the Massachusetts School Building Authority is financed directly out of the somewhat high 6.25% state sales tax.

Therefor renters in town who purchase goods and services pay into the MSBA budget.  And of course when property taxes go up landlords tend to pass that along via rent increases.

At $20.54/$1,000 Amherst already has one of the highest property tax rates in the entire state, ranked #14 out of 351.  Well over the nearby city of Northampton, ranked #158,  at $15.80/$1,000 or Hadley, the hardworking farm town next door, ranked #299 at $10.86/$1,000.

The statewide median average is $15.69/$1,000

 A $200/year tax increase could vault Amherst into the top ten in the state

Since the proposed funding mechanism is a "Debt Exclusion Override" it will require a two-thirds vote of Amherst Town Meeting, a majority vote of the Select Board to place it on the town ballot and a then majority approval of town voters, all before January 1st, 2017.

And the geriatric average age of Town Meeting could work against the proposal since most of the members no longer have children in the public schools.

The financial chart presented above is designed to show how fiscally responsible the proposal for a new mega-school is compared to the alternative at twice the amount.

But it's a tad disingenuous since it assumes Fort River would be renovated/replaced at 100% town taxpayer cost with Wildwood being renovated/replaced with a 50% reimbursement from MSBA.

And School Committee member Vira Douangmany Cage did point out last night that MSBA does pay for renovations short of complete overhauls via their "Major Repairs & Accelerated Repairs" programs, so if Fort River could be partially renovated with their assistance the overall cost would go down dramatically.

But there's no doubt consolidation saves money.  Last night Superintendent Maria Geryk once again cited the $850,000 cost savings that resulted from the bitterly contested closing of Mark's Meadow Elementary School on the UMass campus.  

Interestingly the Town & Schools had signed a five year "Strategic Partnership Agreement" with UMass in 2007 acknowledging the value of free use of Mark's Meadow.

UMass clearly stated they would return to the negotiation table should Mark's Meadow ever close, which of course it did prior to the ending of the five year contract, which is now three years overdo for signing.

Currently Amherst public schools are educating 56 children emanating from UMass tax exempt family housing at an average annual cost of just over $19,000 per student, or over $1 million.

 Click to enlarge/read

Yet UMass is now withholding the local option room tax at their Campus Center Hotel in an attempt to strong arm the town into signing a new Strategic Partnership that probably does not include reimbursement for the high education costs of their children.

So before Amherst taxpayers pass an Override for the schools they should require town officials get UMass to pay its fair share.

In addition the Select Board should show strong support for Representative Stephen Kulik's bill to require tax exempt institutions like Hampshire College (who pays the town nothing for AFD services) and Amherst College, who paid $130K this year, to pay 25% of their assessed value as a Payment In Lieu Of Taxes.

Mega-School It Is

Amherst School Committee will vote on this new proposal on November 3

After an hour of public comment by 17 parents and teachers, many of whom asked the School Committee to slow down and better engage with the general public on this important decision, and then another hour of formal presentation by Assistant Superintendent Mike Morris the BIG decision was, finally, unveiled.

Close down Fort River and Wildwood Elementary Schools and replace them with one large new elementary school (grades 2-6) that will essentially be two schools under one roof.  And turn Crocker Farm, currently preK-6, to PreK-1.

Public Forum on this decision will be held October 26th

 A large crowd attended tonight's SC meeting

 Projected cost for 750 student mega-school $20-$22 Million

Renovating or rebuilding Wildwood alone (K-6 Model) would leave Fort River, which was described as "decrepit" and not ADA compliant, as the black sheep of the public school system.  

New mega-school demographics (click to enlarge)

A Viable 2nd Emergency Exit

Rolling Green Apartments, East Amherst

Disability Access Advisory Committee Chair Gerry Weiss summed up the public safety situation with two simple questions, one to his committee, "How safe would you feel if your main safety feature in a fire was an intercom?"; and then the 2nd directed to Dominic Marinelli, an accessibility consultant, "How far from a burning building would you like to be?"

Mr Marinelli consults for Beacon Industries who purchased Rolling Green Apartments last year for $30 million and was engaging in a conference call this morning with the committee.  

Amherst contributed $1.25 million in Community Preservation Act money towards that purchase in order to keep all 204 units on the Subsidized Housing Inventory, even though only 41 of the units are actually (slightly) below market rate.

At the time Amherst had an SHI of 10.8% so the loss of Rolling Green would have put us well under the 10% threshold, and then subject to a Ch40B development.

But now Beacon Industries wishes to do major renovations at the property costing 30% of assessed value, thus Americans with Disability Act standards kick in.  They were already turned down for a variance by the Massachusetts Architectural Access Board and are currently trying to get the blessing of the Disability Access Committee for a second attempt.

Since Rolling Green does not have any 3 or 4 bedroom units on single floor flat ground (all of them are townhouses) the committee had no major concerns about keeping the accessible units to 1 and 2 bedroom.

The major, major concern was a viable second means of egress from those units, and that's where the sparks started to fly.

The 2nd means of egress was not fully handicapped accessible but would -- stated Mr. Marinelli enthusiastically -- bring the tenant to a "landing" just outside the building as an "area of refuge".  The tenant could then use the intercom to contact help.

 DAAC Chair Gerry Weiss (top center) Senior Planner Nate Malloy (bottom right)

But when asked by town planner Nate Molloy how big was that landing, the response drew disbelief:  30" by 48".  NEXT TO A BURNING BUILDING.

Marinelli instantly said, "I can try to get whatever size you want.  How big do you want it?"

That's when Mr. Weiss asked him "How far from a burning building would you like to be?".  And a few other members murmured, "In a wheelchair!"

The Disability Access Advisory Committee decided they would contact AFD Chief Tim Nelson for his recommendations and talk with Mr Marinelli again at their next meeting.

Rolling Green Apartments 1/23/13  (photo: Steven O'Toole)

That Rolling Green fire was fatal

Home Is Where The Alcohol Is

AFD North Station, overlooking UMass

If UMass needs alcohol to sell the football team then perhaps they should think twice about how viable the game is as a stand alone enterprise.

Homecoming weekend should be about more than just alcohol.

 Lot 22 was ground zero for tailgating

McGuirk Stadium 6:00 PM Saturday

AFD Homecoming runs

17 out of 27 "emergency" runs (63%) to UMass were for excessive alcohol intake, aka ETOH

DUI Dishonor Roll

Sean Moran, age 24, arraigned before Judge John Payne

Amherst police arrested three (relatively) young men over the "Homecoming" weekend.  All of them were charged with drunk driving, and all three told Judge Payne they would be hiring their own attorney so he continued their cases until next month.

Two of the three -- Sean Moran and Kevin Nadeau -- refused to take the Breathalyzer test which could be a sign that they have been down this road before.  And Mr. Moran, after hitting a crowded PVTA bus, also assaulted a police officer.

Click to enlarge/read

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Kevin Nadeau also had problems piloting his vehicle.  In fact, he rolled it over on Sunderland Road, North Amherst.  Fortunately no residents were walking about in zombie herds as college aged youth sometimes do.

Kevin Nadeau, age 26, stands before Judge John Payne

Refusing the Breathalyzer results in automatic loss of license for 180 days

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Anthony Cardullo, age 22, arraigned before Judge Payne

Anthony Cardullo blew through a stop sign on South East Street on to Main Street and was arrested for that failure to stop, as well as for operating under the influence of alcohol which of course contributed to his bad driving.

Mr. Cardullo did take the legally admissible breathalyzer back at APD headquarters with the results of .12 or 1.5 times the legal limit.

Tellingly, Assistant District Attorney Bob Opsitnik confirms he has never lost a drunk driving case over the past year that has gone to trial where a legally admissible breathalyzer was in play.

One Third Of The Way There

To guarantee the Charter question placement on the ballot requires 3,215 voter signatures 

The advantage of Charter change enthusiasts -- aka Amherst For All -- knowing our town well enough to know that antiquated Town Meeting needs to go, is they also know all the popular spots to stake out and let the voters come to them for signature acquisition.

Although I'm told they are also doing the old fashioned neighborhood canvas, something individual politicians (and police) have been doing for generations.

Clare Bertrand and Niels la Cour collecting signatures under their very own tent at Farmers Market

On Saturday a crew was stationed on the Town Common during the Amherst Farmers Market, which also coincided with the UMass Homecoming Parade through town center.

As of close of business today Town Clerk Sandra Burgess confirms her office has certified 1,121 signatures -- or more than one third of the way to target goal.

For the Charter question to appears on the upcoming spring local election ballot proponents must hand in all the required signatures by December 21st .

Thus I'm comfortable predicting Christmas will be a tad more merry this year.

And Another One Gone

All Things Local, 104 North Pleasant Street

Just shy of its second anniversary All Things Local is calling it quits.  For the oldest reason in the book:  spending more than you take in.

The all natural food co-op opened in late November, 2013 in the former location of the Souper Bowl restaurant, who also went out of business due to the same formula.

And so it goes.

We had a good run, Amherst. Thanks for all the support along the way. Go Pats!

— All Things Local (@ATL_Amherst) October 19, 2015

Busy, Brisk Saturday In Our College Town

AFD following UMass Marching Band down North Pleasant Street

Sam The Minuteman

Amherst is always busy when our institutes of higher education are in routine session but even more so today with the largest of the three -- UMass -- celebrating homecoming weekend.

AFD responding to UMass Cance Dorm on Fearing Street for an ETOH (intoxicated) male student.  Great way to start the day.

— Larry Kelley (@amherstac) October 17, 2015

McGuirk Stadium attracted thousands of college football fans (although not nearly enough to satisfy the BIG budget cost of a Division 1 program) many of them warming up for the 3:30 PM game with  tailgating that started at 12:30 PM.

 Amherst A Better Chance Fall Foliage 5K walk/run

The Homecoming Parade, lead by the always motivating UMass Marching Band, wound its way through Amherst town center around 10:45 AM not long after the A Better Chance Fall Foliage 5K race kicked off from our main green.



And as usual Amherst Farmers Market attracted the usual crowd to the heart of our downtown.

Amherst For All took advantage of the crowded downtown to collect voter signatures, surpassing the 1,000 mark toward the 3,215 needed

AFD performed a rescue at Bare Mountain on the top of The Notch in deep South Amherst just before noon, although they did not require the Technical Rescue Team to extricate the injured hiker.

 APD & AFD on scene Bare Mountain 11:55 AM

 McGuirk Stadium 2:45 PM

Fearing Street 3:45 PM (heading towards downtown Amherst from the stadium

Funky clouds over UMass McGuirk Stadium 6:00 PM

As usual AFD was also kept busy dealing with students who consumed too much alcohol, aka ETOH:

 Or what Chief Nelson describes as "Not a quiet a weekend".

Playing Hardball

34,525 sq ft UMass Campus Center hotel competes with private sector hotels in the Valley

In an effort to coerce the town into signing a new multi-year "strategic partnership agreement," aka Payment In Lieu Of Taxes that is long overdue, UMass -- our beloved flagship institute of higher education -- is taking a hard line approach:  withholding payment of a local option room tax everybody else pays, including tax exempt Amherst College.

But in so doing they are most certainly biting the hand that feeds them.  Over the past 30 years there's not been a  bigger legislative cheerleader for UMass/Amherst than Stan Rosenberg, who also just happens to be an Amherst resident.

And currently Stan holds the powerful position of Massachusetts Senate President.

Stan went out of his way back in 2009 to draft legislation specifically to close the loophole that allowed the Campus Center Hotel to dodge our 6% local option tax.

In an email to his staff Stan wrote:

"I want to make sure that we insert language into the bill that effectively says that hotels that are located on college campuses or operated by any other form of nonprofit/education organizations are subject to room occupancy excise. 

This is extremely important as I have been trying to get UMass to the right thing and apply this tax for a very long time voluntarily and they have refused.  This is wrong and I don not want to miss the chance to fix this finally now that we have a chance to do it."

Currently UMass pays the town $455,000 PILOT for AFD ambulance and fire protection.  AFD and 911 Dispatch has a annual budget of $5 million with about 25% of their total runs involving UMass students, so that alone should be well over $1 million in reimbursements.

In addition 56 children living in tax exempt UMass "family housing" attend our public schools, which have a high average cost of education just over $20,000 per student, so that alone should be well over $1 million in reimbursements.

In fact the previous 5 year "strategic partnership agreement" that expired June 30, 2012 specifically stated that if the town closes down Marks Meadow Elementary School the University would come back to the bargaining table and reopen the agreement to consider a cash contribution for educational services. 

Note to UMass:  When you play hardball, sometimes you get beaned in the head.

 UMass is the town's largest employer and #2 landowner behind Amherst College

Legal (technicality) finding in favor of UMass

Amherst Elementary School Closings?

108,000 sq ft Wildwood Elementary School built 1970 and 197,000 sq ft Middle School above center built 1969

The Amherst School Committee will hear school administrators "education plan" on Tuesday night that will set the future of Amherst Public Schools for the next 30 or 40 years.

The School Committee will not vote on that recommendation until their November 3rd meeting, and there is one "community forum" before that, on October 26.

 Wildwood Building Committee met last night at Middle School

That plan could very well consist of closing down Fort River Elementary School and merging/redistricting all the students into Crocker Farm Elementary School and a new mega-sized elementary school building to replace Wildwood Elementary School.

 Overhead presented yesterday to Wildwood Building Committee

Letter from concerned parents:

Click to enlarge/read

Fort River Elementary School

Wait Until Next Year

Simple Gifts Farm, aka North Amherst Community Farm.  Pine Street on right

What some neighbors have dubbed "The Forever Project" -- the Pine Street renovation -- a major east/west thoroughfare just north of UMass, our #1 employer, continues to live up to the name.

The $4 million project will not be totally completed by Thanksgiving the drop dead date for construction projects because asphalt plants close for the season.

Since tax money (both Agricultural Preservation Restriction and Community Preservation Act) assisted in purchasing/preserving the North Amherst Community Farm it took a little longer to get permission to intrude on their land for the sidewalk and crosswalk construction.

By the time permission was obtained the squash had already been planted so now the construction project will have to wait until next year.  Don't want to mess with a farmer's squash crop.

The road itself, however, will be completed by first snowfall.

Another project that is starting to join the realm of forever projects is the intersection of Triangle/East Pleasant at the up and coming north end of downtown.

Guilford Mooring out of the hot seat at last night's PWC meeting

Last night the Public Works Committee discussed the item (along with a bevy of concerned neighbors) for the 8th time over the past 1.5 years.

Intersection of Triangle and East Pleasant Streets will go the way of roundabout

The Committee continues to wholeheartedly support the idea of a roundabout but have not yet seen a detailed enough plan to vote on it.  Neighbors have continually expressed concern about pedestrian/bicycle safety and the town losing its "small town character" via a roundabout.

The Public Works Committee will, probably, vote in favor of the project at their next meeting in November.  The PWC is only an advisory committee appointed by the Select Board, who has final say over "the public way."

Click to enlarge/read

 7/10/14 vote was taken before the town acquired $1.5 million state grant for construction work near the intersection

DUI Dishonor Roll

Of the 1,149 traffic deaths among children ages 0 to 14 years in 2013, 200 (17%) involved an alcohol-impaired driver

Amherst police arrested four impaired drivers over the long holiday weekend, three of them due to alcohol and the remaining one for driving under the influence of drugs.

And not a single one was a UMass student!

Yes Amherst being a college town, the long weekends usually stimulates a mass exodus of our college aged youth.

Interestingly two of the DUI arrests were coming from downtown bars when they were intercepted by police, one from Stackers Pub and the other from The Spoke.

Kind of makes you wonder if the bars get a tad more desperate for business when the students are gone and serve those who should be shut off.

In Eastern Hampshire District Court on Tuesday two of the four took a standard plea deal the Commonwealth offers to first time offenders.  A 24D disposition will cost them $650 in fines/fees, loss of license for 45 days and one year with DUI charge "continued without a finding," aka probation.

But it does save them a couple thousand in legal fees and with a legally admissible Breathalyzer test as evidence against them, the chances of beating the charge is nothing if not slim.

Alex Forrest, age 26, stands before Judge Payne after making a 24D disposition plea

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Cayla Sicard, age 30, had public defender assigned and her case continued to next month

Cayla Sicard was arrested late Sunday afternoon after hitting another vehicle on busy Rt 9 in East Amherst. She also had her two year old son in the vehicle with her at the time.

Her legally admissible breath test came in at .18 more than twice the legal limit.

And as you can see from the video she failed miserably the 9 step walk and turn test.



Ms. Sicard  was released on her own recognizance to appear next month for pre-trial, but she will be subject to random alcohol screenings via the probation department until then.

Allan Tremblay, age 24, also had a pubic defender assigned to him and he will return next month for a pre trial on the charge of OUI drugs

Town Meeting Snoozer

Amherst Town Hall looked busy at least from the outside last night

If last night's turnout for the League of Women Voters/Town Meeting Coordinating Committee Warrant Review is any indication, the annual Special Town Meeting starting November 2 will be lucky to acquire a quorum of its 254 members.

Perhaps because there are no hot button issues on the warrant, although I was surprised the three articles relating to solar development in town did not bring out the NIMBYs, with their solar powered torches and pitchforks.

Maybe two of the dozen who showed up were unaffiliated with the articles at hand

Article #4 (the 1st three are housekeeping articles) would create a Capital Stabilization Fund to squirrel away money to cover BIG ticket capital items coming up:  Wildwood School renovation, new Fire Station, Jones Library expansion, and new DPW facility.

The money comes from $650K already in Free Cash and even with that withdrawal the amount remaining would still be 5% of our total annual budget.

Currently Amherst reserves are 13.8% of budget and the Department of Revenue suggests anywhere from 10% to 15% as a comfortable target goal.

The $26K request for electronic voting devices for Town Meeting could run into trouble due to Town Meeting's geriatric median age.

Or proponents of the new Charter movement to kill off Town Meeting could also see it as a victory for their cause should this item fail.

Town Meeting will also be asked to allow repurposing $150K from previous spending to fix up East Street School so the LSSE recreation department can relocate there.  But bids came back too high so now the town with mothball that idea.

The money would outfit 4,000 square feet of the Amherst Regional Middle School as office space and interim Town Manager Dave Ziomek confirmed it does not require the recently talked about relocation of 7th and 8th grade students into the High School.

 Peggy Roberts TMCC Chair.  Interim Town Manager Dave Ziomek addressed the "crowd"

Since the Middle School is a total of 197,000 square feet and student enrollment has declined since it first built, the 2% of total taken up by LSSE will not even be noticed.

The two Community Preservation Act financed projects -- North Common and Crocker Farm pre school playground rehabs will pass handily.  Even with all that spending ($430K) the CPA fund balance will still have over three quarters of a million left over.

Since it appears nothing overly controversial appears on the warrant -- but with Town Meeting you never know -- November 2nd alone probably will not be enough time.  But certainly only two nights will be required to complete all 15 articles.

A refreshing break from our annual spring Town Meeting, which drones on and on and on ...