Polls open at 6 a.m. Thursday for Farmington voters to cast their ballots on the proposed $135 million in renovations to the town's high school.
The proposal, which has formally been in development for about nine months, calls for the demolition of nearly all existing buildings at the high school campus on Monteith Drive. A new building would be built at the same location while repurposing some existing portions, including the original high school, built in 1928, which will be preserved as the board of education central office.
The Farmington High School Building Committee recommended the complete overhaul to the town council this spring, calling it the best option to address a slew of problems at the aging school, including a lack of handicap accessibility in some areas, energy inefficiencies and inadequate parking.
If approved at referendum, phased construction would run from fall 2018 until summer 2022, beginning with a new, three-story academic wing – as well as the school's new main entrance – that would be finished by fall 2020.
Unlike the town's budget referendum, in which less than 15 percent voter turnout results in automatic approval, the majority vote will determine the project's fate.
For registered voters in the first district, the first through fourth precincts will vote at Irving Robbins Middle School, 20 Wolf Pit Road. Voters in the fifth precinct will vote at West Woods Upper Elementary School, 50 Judson Lane.In the second district, voters in the sixth precinct vote at the Community/Senior Center, 321 New Britain Ave. The seventh precinct will vote at the municipal campus on Monteith Drive.
Federal judge orders environmental review of Dakota Access pipeline
A federal judge in Washington, D.C., on Wednesday ordered the Trump administration to conduct further environmental reviews of the Dakota Access pipeline but stopped short of halting oil-pumping operations pending further hearings beginning June 21.
U.S. District Judge James Boasberg handed a limited victory to Native American tribes in North Dakota that had challenged the administration's effort to speed the project, and his dense, 91-page opinion directed both sides to appear before him next Wednesday to decide next legal steps.
While the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers "substantially complied" with federal environmental laws, Boasberg wrote, "it did not adequately consider the impacts of an oil spill on fishing rights, hunting rights, or environmental justice, or the degree to which the pipeline's effects are likely to be highly controversial."
Boasberg's decision comes just weeks after Dallas-based Energy Transfer Partners had begun pumping crude oil through the 1,170-mile line carrying North Dakota oil through South Dakota and Iowa to a distribution point in Illinois."Whether Dakota Access must cease pipeline operations" while the additional reviews are done "presents a separate question of the appropriate remedy, which will be the subject of further briefing," Boasberg ruled.
David Debold, an attorney for Dakota Access, and Daryl Owen, a lobbyist representing Energy Transfer Partners, did not immediately respond to emailed requests for comment.
Four Sioux tribes in the Dakotas have asked the court to shut down oil-pumping operations. Boasberg in February rejected emergency requests by the Standing Rock and Cheyenne River Sioux tribes grounded in cultural preservation and religious freedom claims, the latter of which was based on the tribes' argument that the pipeline would desecrate the Missouri River and Lake Oahe, integral parts of their religious practices.
2 more mixed-use developments planned for West Haven’s Allingtown
WEST HAVEN >> The Atwood, a 90,150-square-foot, mixed-use building that David Beckerman’s Acorn Group is putting up on the former Route 1 site of Carroll Cut-Rate Furniture, isn’t quite finished yet. But Beckerman appears ready to follow it up with two similar developments that would remake the heart of the Allingtown section.
As construction workers working for Acorn development affiliate Forest Road Manor LLC are putting the interior finishes on the four-story Atwood, which will offer 67 market-rate apartments and 16,000 square feet of ground-floor retail space, marketing people have put out a two-page flyer touting two similar-sized buildings.“The Forest” would be built on the former site of the Forest Theater at the main intersection of the Boston Post Road, Campbell Avenue and Forest Road, and “Park Place” would be built behind the Allingtown Green along what now is Cellini Place — but in the brochure’s rendering, looks as if it would be abandoned.The Acorn Group website, which calls the flyer’s “Park Place” building “Park View,” refers to them collectively as “University Commons.” The flyer, entitled “Be Part of The Birth of a College Town,” was posted Tuesday on the city’s website, along with a short narrative. It shows The Forest with 50 apartments and 16,000 square feet of retail space and Park Place as offering 62 apartments and 18,000 square feet of retail space.
Together, they add up to 240,000 total square feet of development, including 50,000 square feet of retail space and 179 apartments — with an estimated total of 400 new residences between them.“I hope my fellow Westies are as excited as I am about the forthcoming opening of The Atwood, an upscale housing and retail development that will generate much-needed property tax revenue for the city while helping to transform our Allingtown neighborhood into a true college community,” Mayor Ed O’Brien said in an emailed statement.“I am grateful to David Beckerman for bringing his unique vision to this project, which is expected to include at least three national tenants,” said O’Brien, who joined Beckerman, the former Starter Corp. CEO, and Acorn Group Vice President Gary S. Letendre Wednesday for a tour of The Atwood to see its progress.The statement did not address the two additional buildings shown on the CLICK TITLE TO CONTINUE