Board finalizes $26.9M
school expansion plans
Taxpayers will be asked Dec. 11 or Jan. 28 to fund $18.6M of the cost
By darlene diebold
Staff Writer
HOLMDEL — The Board of Education has finalized plans for an $18.6 million school construction referendum which will include a major expansion of Village School to include separate wings for grades preK-1 and grades 2-3. The targeted referendum date is Dec. 11.
The board wants to add approximately 58,000 square feet to the school on McCampbell Road, changing it from a grades K-2 to a preK-3 school, and another approximately 30,000 square feet to the high school. It previously planned to seek voter approval for a new grades 2-3 facility but scrapped those plans because of increased costs.
Referendum plans also include renovations at both schools for a total cost of $26,859,000. The board expects the state to pick up $8,290,640 through its multimillion dollar school construction bill, which funds up to 40 percent of approved costs.
The Village School improvements would run $12,896,000, and the high school improvements, $6,707,000. Costs also include $7,356,000 for capital improvements to all four district schools including the installation of air conditioning at Village, Satz and the old wing of Indian Hill School. Indian Hill, which was expanded several years ago, currently houses grades 3-6, with separate grades 3-4 and 5-6 houses, and Satz School, grades 7-8.
At a special Sept. 5 meeting held before a small audience, the board voted 8-0 to approve schematics and educational specifications for the referendum. Board member Catherine Webber was absent.
Plans needed to be submitted to the state as soon as possible to meet a December referendum deadline, said board architect Ted Hopkins of Faridy, Veisz, Fraytak, Trenton. If the board misses the deadline for approval to hold a Dec. 11 referendum, it plans to hold it Jan. 28. In the past the state Department of Education has only taken about two or three weeks to approve referendum plans, but that has changed and it can now take up to 90 days, Hopkins said. The county clerk must have the state approval by Oct. 12 in order for a Dec. 11 referendum to move forward.
Board President Frank Pento explained the demographic numbers which show that unlike Indian Hill School, Village School will not reach capacity as soon as the expansion is completed.
Old demographic numbers indicated that that might happen, but new numbers, based on the latest census information and input from the Planning Board, tell a different story.
Pento explained that live births had decreased since the 1990 census; more importantly, he said, the number of babies being born and then entering kindergarten has dropped by 50 percent.
"That had a major impact on our demographic data," he said. "We can be confident, based on these numbers … that our plan (for the new addition) will take us out to 2008. This plan will last five years from when it opens. I think that’s pretty responsible."
Pento also said that moving grade three from Indian Hill to Village School will keep Indian Hill School below capacity until 2008.
The revised Aug. 30 demographics show that the district will have a total enrollment of 4,195 students by 2010, up from 3,479 this year, according to the Aug. 30 projection. The high school population will increase from 1,038 students to 1,359; grades 6-8, from 917 to 1,113; and the K-5 population, from 1,524 students to 1,723.
Enrollment as of Friday was 697 students at Village School, 1,100 students at Indian Hill, 619 students at Satz, and 1,057 students at the high school.
Superintendent Leigh Byron also discussed the proposed traffic arrangement at the expanded Village School over which parents have expressed concern. Byron said at the meeting that he met with township traffic safety officer Sgt. Don Hughes who told him that strategically placed directional signs, together with speed bumps, would adequately control the traffic.
Concerns were also raised about possible parking problems when the school is completed. According to the plans, there will be 125 parking spaces at the school, which parent Robin Whetmore worried would be completely taken up by teachers and administrators.
"I am concerned about the size of the parking lot," she said. "We all know we cannot park on McCampbell Road without being ticketed."
Byron said that when buses are not at the school, parents and visitors will be able to use the 13 bus lanes which will hold 26 buses. Board member Brian McMullen said that the dirt road on the side of the school could be paved for any possible overflow parking.
"This will not be like Indian Hill School. This (parking) design will work," Byron said.
To expand on the differences, Byron said that the two-house school would be better staffed. Village School currently has about 700 students and one administrator; with the expansion it would have approximately 1,100 students and three administrators including two assistant principals, he said.
"We are making an emphatic commitment to staff these two houses to make them feel like two schools," Pento said, adding that he feels it is very important to have the intimate setting at the school that parents have been asking for.
Byron tried to assure the public that the added wing will not result in too big of a school.
"It’s not that big of a place where children will be lost," he explained.
New Village School Principal Nancy Lubarsky explained the typical day for the students and showed on the plans how the students will have a much easier time at the school. It is a "very confined area," she said. "From an adult experience, it may seem large, but for the children, it will seem much smaller."
Marylou Moramarco, one of two people who originally spoke out against the proposal, said, "I think Dr. Lubarsky’s presentation made me see a little bit clearer that it is not as big and scary [from a child’s perspective] as it probably is now. I still don’t believe that everybody in this room believes that this is the best plan. I think if we thought a new school would pass, I think all of us would be behind it. I feel that this is probably the best plan that would fly, and we all need to support it."