Our students deserve better
We were all shocked and a little angry to hear that yet another Greenwich school was closed on an emergency basis last week — I know I was. Once again, our kids are suffering due to a situation that was entirely avoidable.
The closure of Central Middle School because it is not “deemed safe” is just another in the long litany of failures of the Board of Education and Schools Superintendent Toni Jones in prioritizing and completing the needed school construction and maintenance. Yet, we can all expect a clever and false communications campaign and finger-pointing to distract from the truth. It’s already happening.
Before this year, Jones scheduled Central Middle School to be replaced by 2034 — 12 years from today. Greenwich Public Schools administrators and BOE members knew the school was in dire shape, as evidenced by monitors placed on the building, as well as other remediation that has been done and was requested for the building. While the Board of Estimate and Taxation did not approve some monies in last year’s budget due to the BOE’s priority of the building to begin in 2030 and completed in 2034, nonetheless, the BOE subsequently found the money to complete the study that prompted last week’s closure. Indeed, Central Middle School was not even in the superintendent’s budget this year. It was only after BOE Republicans insisted it be placed in the budget that the line item appeared BOE budget and the project was moved from 2034 to 2026.
What is the problem? Through the years, the superintendent and BOE continually ignored the recommendations of architects and professional engineers when prioritizing capital and maintenance. In 2017-18, the BOE, at the direct demand (and funding) of the Board of Estimate and Taxation, hired KG&D, now the BOE’s lead architecture firm, to assess all 15 schools. KG&D recommended replacement of Central Middle School as a high priority, noting “intrinsic structural issues”.
Why did Jones, facilities head Dan Watson, and then-BOE Chair Peter Bernstein ignore these warnings? We could ask the other members of the BOE what they were thinking. But a review of the records shows that the BOE never discussed delaying the Central Middle School’s rebuild until 2034. They have never formally voted to accept the capital program schedule published by Jones.
Instead, the BOE prioritized rebuilding Cardinal Stadium which was not even contained in the original KG&D facility plan. After inquiries from the BET, the BOE’s priority for Central Middle School has moved to 2026. BOE members should have been making these decisions on their own, not at the prompting of the town’s finance board. Clearly, something is wrong with the BOE’s planning methods when they prioritize and plan other projects before critically needed ones.
Our kids deserve better. It is time that school construction and maintenance be removed from the Board of Education and placed under professional construction management. Let the BOE and its administrators focus on the core mission of educating children. Only then can we be assured that the planning and completion of construction projects that are required for our schools will be done in a timely manner. This is the time to ensure that what has happened at Central Middle School will not happen again.