Officials call for referendum on school building privatization

STAMFORD — As a vote approaches Monday night to move forward the proposed privatization of several city school buildings, members of three crucial boards are calling for the matter to first be put to the public.

Board of Representatives member Nina Sherwood, Board of Education member Mike Altamura and Board of Finance member Kieran Ryan in an op-ed this week have called for a referendum on the issue.

“For me to turn around and sell a third of their

“For me to turn around and sell a third of their public school property seems so immoral to me.”

Nina Sherwood, member, Stamford Board of Representatives

public school property seems so immoral to me,” Sherwood said, referring to Stamford taxpayers. “It’s their land. It’s their

The public-private partnership idea involves selling five aging public school buildings to a private developer for $1 each. The developer would then demolish, rebuild and maintain the new structures, while leasing them back to the city for up to 90 years.

Sherwood, Ryan and Altamura reference a section of the City Charter that says any sale of park land in Stamford that’s more than 20,000 square feet should be decided by public vote. The public-private plan would involve selling

more than 1 million square feet of land, but since all of it is defined as school land, it does not fall inside the definition in the Charter.

Still, Sherwood’s argument is that those who crafted the Charter would have likely wanted such a large sale of land to go to a referendum.

The op-ed she co-wrote reads, “It’s likely that the current plan for the city to sell and then lease back formerly city-owned school property is one the Charter drafters never imagined. After all, it’s a proposition well out of the ordinary.”

They have raised the referendum question as the Board of Representatives is to vote Monday on a reschools.”

quest for quotation, or RFQ, in which the city would spend $250,000 to hire a firm to draft documents seeking proposals from developers interested in building, owning and maintaining new schools.

Representatives voted 29-5 to postpone the matter on Feb. 3. Some members of the board said they didn’t vote in favor because they wanted to see more options for building new schools.

Two other RFQs to be voted on Monday include one for an evaluation of prefabrication options for new school buildings and another to compare Stamford’s construction and maintenance of buildings to surrounding school districts.

Each of those items would cost $8,000.

The Board of Finance and Planning Board have approved all of the aforementioned requests.

Monday’s meeting of the representatives will be the first since schools Superintendent Tamu Lucero has taken over as the head of the Stamford Asset Management Group, which was formed to manage school buildings.

Lucero took over as head of the SAMG after director of administration Michael Handler stepped down this week.

She said the departure of Handler, the chief architect and driver of the privatization

plan, does not signal a change in direction for the group.

“While there has been some speculation that the recently announced departure of Mr. Handler from the city would impact our need for, or commitment to, these RFQs, I assure you, that his departure has no impact on our commitment to moving forward with the RFQs,” Lucero wrote, in an emailed letter to school staff and families on Friday afternoon.

She added, “We are at a critical crossroads in Stamford as it relates to school facilities … While we may not all agree on everything, I know we can agree that doing nothing is certainly

not an option.”

Ryan and Sherwood said selling school property might necessitate a Charter revision, which would require collecting signatures from Stamford residents and then forming a Charter revision committee to oversee the potential changes.

Ryan said he simply wants to start a conversation about how the city should decide the sale of so much land.

“I know I would be reluctant to vote for any expansive plan without seriously considering putting it to a public referendum,” he said.