Danbury to close satellite school in Brookfield
DANBURY — With the annex to Ellsworth Avenue Elementary School expected to open on time, Danbury plans to close its its primary center in Brookfield.
The district anticipates it can safely fit all students into school buildings in Danbury next academic year, and the rented Brookfield building would need upgrades to remain open, Superintendent Kevin Walston said.
“Given those additional investments that would be necessary to open up the building, we feel like it’s in our best interest to come out of the lease at this time,” he told the school board on Wednesday.
The district opened the Danbury Primary Center at a vacant Catholic school building in Brookfield this fall because all students could not fit in the city schools under COVID-19 spacing guidelines. Danbury signed a two-year lease, with the option to opt out after one year, Walston said.
Eleven classes of 240 kindergartners from Ellsworth, South Street Elementary School and Stadley Rough Elementary School moved into the Danbury Primary Center.
The district initially budgeted $1.86 million for the lease and furniture at the primary center and other schools. However, Danbury went several hundred thousand dollars over its budget for the primary center and would need to invest another roughly $200,000 to keep the building open, Walston said.
The school district’s facilities director says the school needs an additional boiler to make sure all classrooms stay warm. Plus, the air conditioning doesn’t reach all the classrooms, so work would be needed there, Walston said.
This would be on top of a nearly $200,000 renovation completed over the summer to add classrooms for music, art, special education and English as a second language. The district purchased $65,000 in furniture, including 240 desks for students, as well as a desk and bookcase for each teacher.
Federal coronavirus relief funds covered these costs, but those grants will be exhausted in a few years. Officials are worried Danbury will fall of a “financial cliff” when those funds run out, Walston said.
With four sections of kindergartners moving into the new space at Ellsworth, the primary center would have had only seven sections. There’s space for those students to move back to Stadley Rough and South Street, Walston said.
“We’re mindful that the CDC guidelines are still in place, but we’ve also learned a lot since we have moved our students out,” he said. “We feel like we can move students back to their respective schools and do so safely, as long as we follow the mitigation strategies.”
Construction on the seven-classroom annex to Ellsworth Avenue Elementary School started last year. The project is meant to help address rising enrollment at the elementary level. Students should be able to move into the addition in the fall.
“Certainly we’ve had significant growth in the downtown area, particularly at Ellsworth,” Walston said. “I’m very happy to announce that they’re projected to open on time.”