With Norwalk High School and SoNo School under construction, Common Council authorizes $200M+
NORWALK — With construction on schedule at the new Norwalk
High School and South
Norwalk School, the city’s Common Council authorized hundreds of millions
in funding for the high school’s construction.
For the high school, the council approved a supplemental
appropriation of $189 million to have the full $239 million project cost
authorized. The council also issued $15 million in general obligation bonds as
“cash on hand” for the project, according to Chief
Financial Officer Jared Schmitt.
The state plans to reimburse the city for 80 percent of the
cost of the high school, meaning taxpayers are responsible for $47.8 million,
but the city still needed to authorize spending for the full amount.
“As we’re applying for the reimbursement for the project as
it goes along, there may be a lag in time where we don't have the grant from
the state,” Schmitt said in the council’s meeting Tuesday. “This
($15 million) is, kind of, gap money.”
Additionally, the council moved $19 million from the South
Norwalk School project to the high school.
Council Member At-Large Greg Burnett said the city initially
doled out $72 million for the South Norwalk School when the project had a 22
percent state reimbursement rate — now, that rate is 60 percent.
“We’re now able to move those funds to the new Norwalk High
School,” Burnett said.
At the site of the new high school, formerly Testa Field,
contractors are installing aggregate piling into the soil to “provide support
for the foundation,” per Alan Lo, the city’s building and facilities manager.
Aggregate piles are gravel columns installed underground by
filling tubes with small rocks, Lo said. At other parts of the high school
site, excavation is ongoing, he said.
“(With) such a big building, we can do one thing on one side
and do another thing on the other side,” Lo said. “The building is so big.”
In roughly two weeks, Lo said, excavation should be complete
and all aggregate piles will be in the ground so contractors can lay a
foundation and install footing for the building.
At the site of the incoming South Norwalk School, Lo said
excavation is complete and contractors have installed roughly 60 percent of the
necessary footings.
“We’ve been progressing very well,” the building and
facilities manager said.
In April, the the city was under contract with four of
the six
properties abutting the site of the South Norwalk School; now, the city
owns 32 Oxford St., 36 Oxford St. and 38 Oxford St.
Lo said the city expects to close on 28 Oxford St. in the
next two to three weeks.
Continuing from April, the city is in good faith
negotiations with the owners of 16 Meadow St. Ext. and a 1.13-acre South Main
Rail Corridor parcel.
The South Norwalk School is slated for completion in August
2025 and the new Norwalk High School should welcome its first class two years
later.
New schools project in Norwich is $50M over budget
Claire Bessette
Norwich ― The school construction project will cost at least
$50 million more than the $385 million approved by voters in 2022, due to
increased construction and labor expenses, project officials said.
The School Building Committee recently received the sobering
news just as the plans for the first two new schools, the Greeneville and John
B. Stanton elementary schools, received planning commission approval on
Wednesday.
According to updated estimates provided by Mike Faenz, the
city’s owner’s representative from Construction Solutions, Inc., the cost of
the four new elementary schools now total $310.8 million.
Adding the final two projects ― the $99 million overhaul of
the Teachers’ Memorial Global Studies Middle School and a $25 million
renovation to Samuel Huntington School as the new central office and adult
education building ― increases the total to $434.9 million.
The total is likely to go higher because updated cost
estimates are not yet available for Teachers’ Memorial and Huntington schools.
School Building Committee Chairman and Alderman Mark
Bettencourt said project officials learned early on that the cost for the new
school on the former Greeneville School site would be higher, because of a
rocky, steep-sloped topography.
Inflation and widespread construction cost increases have
spiraled beyond expectations for the John M. Moriarty and Uncas schools as
well, far exceeding the 8% escalation factor in the original budget.
The projected cost for Moriarty jumped from $64.2 million to
$80.6 million, and Uncas from $66.7 million to $81.8 million.
“The City Council is going to have to discuss this at some
length on what we’re going to do,” Bettencourt said.
Mayor Peter Nystrom said the council is planning an
executive session at the end of Monday’s meeting to discuss the cost overruns.
The city could also ask voters in November to approve the
higher costs or alter the project.
Bettencourt and Board of Education Chairman Mark Kulos
warned that the need for the project has not diminished. The city’s seven aging
elementary schools and Teachers Memorial Global Studies Middle School are in
dire need of repairs and upgrades to meet state building code requirements.
“Stanton is being held together with baling wire and
string,” Bettencourt said at the June 18 building committee meeting. “They’re
doing classes in hallways. Our best chance to alleviate some of these issues is
trying to get the new numbers passed.”
A key selling point for the $385 million referendum was a
building assessment study that estimated the cost of needed repairs at $222
million without any state reimbursement for those repairs.
In contrast, the city will receive 80% state reimbursement
for the first two new schools and hopes for the same for the next two schools.
The application for reimbursement will be submitted this week.
Nystrom said one option would be to go forward with the four
new elementary schools and delay work on Teachers’ Memorial and the Huntington
School to a future project.
The building committee on June 18 voted to obtain cost
estimates for a new Teachers’ Memorial school instead of a renovation. A new
school might be less expensive.
There is still time to plan for a referendum in November,
Nystrom said. The council would need to draft an ordinance and hold a public
hearing before placing the question on the ballot.
But the building committee will not have final costs for the
Stanton and Greeneville schools until it receives construction bids in January.
“There is some thought of waiting until we get actual
construction bids on the first schools in January,” Bettencourt said. “If we do
that, we will miss the opportunity to go to referendum in November. It would
stop the project until we went (to referendum) to get new numbers.”
Kulos said project delays would hurt the school operating
budget. The new schools include space to accommodate more special education
students now bused to expensive out-of-town specialty schools. Those costs are
a leading factor in the school budget ending in a projected $4 million deficit
this year.
“The superintendent is counting on that for operational
budget savings,” Kulos said.
Bettencourt said stopping the project or putting off parts
of it would only raise costs and require the city to pay for repairs with no
state reimbursement.
“It’s a complicated thing with a lot of moving parts,
because of the nature of the thing and the large scope of the project,”
Bettencourt said. “There’s a reason we wanted to go that way.”
Updated plan for Gold Star Highway properties calls for 390 apartments, realigned entrance
Kimberly Drelich
Groton ― An updated plan for the town-owned 517 & 529
Gold Star Highway properties, along with adjacent privately-owned parcels,
calls for 390 apartments, housed within five, five-story buildings, and
amenities that include a clubhouse and pool.
The Town Council at its Committee of the Whole meeting
Tuesday evening approved the updated concept plan and a one-year extension to
the option agreement, which was set to expire in September.
The Town Council is slated to take a final vote on July 2.
The previous concept plan approved by the council envisioned
about 300 apartments within four, four-story buildings.
At the town’s request, the new plan also realigns the
proposed development’s entrance with a signalized intersection at Gold Star
Highway and Toll Gate Road.
New multifamily housing developer
Jon Reiner, the town’s director of planning and development
services, said this week that in 2019, the town started working with PJ&A
LLC as the preferred developer for the town-owned properties.
He said the properties, which have a lot of ledge and are
expensive to develop, were once part of a larger development proposal 10 to 15
years ago that did not come to fruition, and the town had acquired them through
foreclosure.
“We’re just eager to get it back on the tax rolls since the
town foreclosed on the property in 2015,” said Paige Bronk, the town’s economic
and community development manager.
Attorney William R. Sweeney wrote in a May letter to the
town that over the last several years, PJ&A has worked with several
multifamily developers to design and permit the proposed apartment project.
“Due primarily to exceptional sitework costs as well as
other related engineering challenges, these efforts have been unsuccessful to
date,” Sweeney wrote.
Recently, PJ&A entered into an agreement with Orr
Partners, a Virginia-based developer. Orr Partners has developed about 5,000
multifamily units in the eastern part of the country. Orr Partners has an
office in Groton and has overseen the construction of facilities for Electric
Boat, according to the letter from Sweeney.
The Town Council at a Committee of the Whole meeting earlier
this month approved assigning the option agreement for sale of the town-owned
property to Orr Partners, Reiner said.
Reiner and Bronk said two privately owned parcels, which are
almost six acres in total and which are adjacent to the 11.75-acre town-owned
properties, are part of the redevelopment proposal. The privately-owned
properties, the former Shetucket Plumbing site and a parcel adjacent to it,
will help align the development entrance with the existing intersection with a
signal light.
Market-rate apartments
Sweeney told the Council on Tuesday that the five stories
with the additional units are needed to offset the cost of the additional rock
removal and the realignment of the entrance.
He said the new concept plan also has a smaller development
footprint, and there is a larger buffer between the development and Avalonia
Land Conservancy land to the south.
Reiner said the proposal will help get more more housing
built, get properties back on the tax rolls and would be a good neighbor for
Avalonia.
Sweeney said the apartments will be rented at market rates.
He said the rents will probably be a little more than $2,000 for two-bedroom
units and a little less for one-bedroom units and studios.
During the review, councilors asked questions and said the
project would help with the housing shortage, but asked the developer to
consider implementing environmentally friendly features such as solar panels,
adding an affordable housing component and building a playground and dog park.
Sweeney said the next step is to prepare plans to submit to
the town’s Planning and Zoning Commission, and then to apply for a state
traffic permit.
Sweeney said the project will be built in phases over two
years and units are currently anticipated to be occupied in the spring of 2028.
Deficiencies in New Milford High School's 'traumatic' roof project to be fixed
NEW MILFORD — Work to remediate sections of the New
Milford High School roof that were insufficiently repaired is expected
to be completed over the summer, starting in July, officials say.
“We had a conference call with the bonding company last week
and included all the Board of Education partners,” Mayor Pete Bass said at the
Town Council meeting on Monday. “They’re going to deploy all their resources to
fix that portion of the roof… They did agree to do the right thing, which is to
make the high school roof contractually [finished] like it should have been all
along.”
The six-year-long ordeal has included two fires, leaks and
the discovery that some panels had been fastened improperly.
The town and school board have been discussing
their options for finalizing repairs on the roof over the last five
months — particularly in terms of addressing the fasteners and clips
installed on the roof by United Roofing & Sheet Metal, the project’s
original contractor. Officials also remedied persistent leaking issues in the
roof that were traced
back to the roof’s cupola this past spring.
The roof project began about six years ago as a $4.75
million effort to upgrade the aging roof and repair damage
from a microburst storm in 2018. Silver Petrucelli & Associates,
hired by the town in 2020, recommended replacing
the asphalt roof and restoring the flat roof with a standing seam roof.
Work on the roof was delayed after
the roof caught fire twice, with the second fire in July 2022 causing
damages to the roof and the high school building.
While repairs
were completed late last year by Greenwood Industries, a roofing
contractor, safety
concerns were raised about the fasteners and clips installed by the
original company.
Dean Petrucelli, architect for Silver Petrucelli & Associates,
reported to the town’s Municipal Building Committee last May that some of the
roof’s panels had been fastened with two screws while other panels had been
fastened with only one screw, according
to the committee’s meeting minutes. United Roofing had completed part
of the project but was fired after the second roof blaze.
The contractor Fuss & O’Neill, hired by the town in
September to assess the standing seam metal roof, found single screws at many
clips on the roof as well as “sporadic” spacing of the screws, according to an
Oct. 10 report from Fuss & O’Neill’s senior project manager
Richard Boggs.
Yet Boggs said in his Oct. 10 report that Fuss & O’Neill
did not believe the fasteners’ installation posed “an immediate safety
risk” to the building’s occupants, and the roof’s deficiencies will “only
be significant” in a severe weather event that results in winds speeds
in the range of 120 mph.
‘Now’s the time’
Wendy Faulenbach, chairperson of the school board, said at the board’s June 18 meeting the board was notified of plans to work on the roof this summer to bring the roof “to the caliber that was in the scope of the project.Top of Form
“We want that roof to be repaired,” Faulenbach said. “For me
personally, this is the time to have it happen when you don’t have students and
staff in the building at the capacity that we normally do. I endorse whatever
we can to get that project rectified, completed, warranteed, bonded and
reimbursed and have it safe… by the scope of the project of which it was
designed. Now’s the time.”
Faulenbach said the project’s tentative start date is July
8.
Bass said at the council’s June 18 meeting that Crum &
Forster, the bonding company assigned to the roof project, has been assigned to
the new project, which he said will entail repairing the affected section of
the roof panel by panel.
He said there will be a clerk that will catalog, document
and take pictures of every step in the project — including every screw, panel,
pin and clip — and the project is expected to take 100 days to complete.
Garland, the manufacturer assigned to the fasteners, will guarantee the roof
after repairs are completed, which will allow for reimbursement from the state
Department of Education, Bass said.
“There’s been true damage to our community,” Faulenbach
on the roof project’s impact. “We’re not talking dollars — we’re talking
traumatic to our students and staff.”
Connecticut Senate passes fixes to car tax and school construction issues in special session
HARTFORD — The Democratic dominated state Senate, over
Republican opposition, on Wednesday approved legislation containing eight
separate pieces in an omnibus
bill ranging from a lowering of commercial vehicle taxes in some of
Connecticut's higher-taxed communities, to prohibiting state employees from
subcontracting school construction projects, and expediting the review
process for the development
of historic buildings.
The three-hour-long Senate session was highlighted by GOP
criticism of a provision that would allow for a Connecticut-based
water company to purchase Aquarion, as well as a protracted argument over
whether an effort to lower
taxes on commercial vehicles would include a long-term,
five-percent hike
on residential vehicle taxes. The GOP lawmakers offered three amendments
that were all rejected along party lines.
The 20-to-9 final vote with seven senators missing
occurred at 3:15 p.m. in the first day of the two-day
gathering of the General Assembly, which continues with the House of
Representatives on Thursday.
Republicans warned that the proposed change in state
law to allow the New Haven-based South Central Connecticut Regional Water
Authority to bid for Aquarion, a division of the Massachusetts-based
Eversource, could backfire in higher rates for Aquarion's current 59-town
service area. They sharply criticized the possible deal's inclusion in the
special legislative session, whose agenda items were brought up under so-called
emergency provisions of the General Assembly.
Democrats said any potential deal creating a new
Aquarion Water Authority would first have to be approved by the state Public
Utilities Regulatory Authority.
Senate Minority Leader Stephen Harding, R-Brookfield,
stressed that because the water company provision was never discussed in the
recent regular session of the General Assembly, the issue should not have been
part of Wednesday's agenda. "This is something that's going to impact the
water rates and the water supply to 700,000 people in the state of Connecticut
and we're saying to them that we don't even want a public hearing on
this," Harding said. "What does that say to our constituency?"
At about 12:15, Harding started off the session with a
scolding of the chamber, calling the overall bill "an aircraft
carrier" with so many different pieces. He proposed "dividing
the question" and voting separately on the water company part.
The proposal was rejected along party lines 19-to-9 with 8
absent in the chamber, which is dominated by Democrats 24-12.
By 12:40, Sen. John Fonfara, D-Hartford, co-chairman of the
tax-writing legislative Finance Committee started the main debate, explaining a
portion of the law that is needed, because without action,"significant
difficulties" would occur starting Oct. 1 for commercial vehicle owners in
46 towns and cities with tax rates above 32.46 mills, including as many as 11
towns, especially Waterbury, Hartford and Hamden, that would be taxed at
higher levels. Vehicle depreciation rates would also be changed.
"Without action today this change would result in
significant difficulty for both town assessors and commercial vehicle
owners," Fonfara said. "Commercial motor vehicle owners would be
assessed as personal property."
"There were underlying mistakes in the bill," said
Sen. Norm Needleman, D-Essex, noting lingering problems date back to 2022
legislation. Needleman, who is also the first selectman of his hometown,
said a fixed assessment level is important, including the 20-year phase-in
eventually reducing car values to $500.
Another portion of the bill would allow local tax officials
around the state to study and potentially enact the lowering and even
phasing-out of personal property taxes on vehicles, effective in July of 2025.
"If you live in a city and you look at your car and you
go to a suburb right next to it, the difference in taxation is very
apparent," said Senate Majority Leader Bob Duff, D-Norwalk. "It's one
that really makes your eyes pop out. There's an unfairness there. If we're
telling people we're trying to invest in our cities and our municipalities and
our urban areas, but yet it costs more to live there, that is really against
the policies we're trying to put forward in this state."
The financial portion of the 137-page bill, at the request
of Gov. Ned Lamont,
aims to make Connecticut more attractive for bank-to-bank lenders by changing
the definition of uninsured banks in the state to "innovation banks."
It would also make changes in interest rates on late tax filings of
underpayments for insurance companies, dating back to the federal pandemic
relief for employee retention.
State Sen. Rob Sampson, R-Wolcott, whose district includes
part of Waterbury, called the change to commercial vehicle
taxes appropriate and needed, but the proposed depreciation rate concerns
him. "Why are we going to increase the value of everyone's car by 5
percent over the next 20 years?" Sampson said. "I have promised by
constituents I would not vote to raise taxes."
Fonfara said towns would receive less revenue. "If
towns are receiving less revenue, car owners are paying less in taxes,"
Fonfara said.
Sampson said he was worried about average private vehicle
owners paying more over time and he introduced an amendment aimed at making car
taxes lower. Fonfara opposed the amendment, which was defeated along party
lines.
"Characterizing this as a tax increase is just
incorrect," Needleman said during the debate on the amendment. "With
a little bit of luck we will never hear about this again."
Sen. Ryan Fazio, R-Greenwich said that raising the
depreciation level for new cars from the current 80 percent to 85, as detailed
in the bill, clearly raises taxes for owners. "The affordability of
Connecticut is a stressor on Connecticut families," said Sen. Kevin
Kelly, R-Stratford. "The Connecticut family is struggling each day, living
paycheck to paycheck."
"What we're simply doing doing today is changing the
tax rate from 80 percent to 85 percent," Harding said. "Eighty five
is more than 80, period. You can try to do fuzzy math all you want."
"Assessments don't determine taxes," said Senate
President Pro Tempore Martin Looney, D-New Haven, "mill rates determine
taxes." He said that there was a "spike" in used car values at
the height of the pandemic because of supply chain problems. "Whether it's
80 or 85, the decision is still in the hands of the municipality to decide what
its rate will bill. In addition to that, we are reminding municipalities in
this bill, where the authority in some cases may not be clear, that they do in
fact have the option of creating a differential car tax, as long as the car tax
is lower than the tax on real and commercial property."
Amid decarbonization efforts, New England’s energy demand expected to increase 23% over next decade
New England’s energy demand is expected to increase 23% over
the next decade, the head of the region’s largest power generator association
said at an annual energy conference earlier this month, and stakeholders in the
region should focus on energy reliability and affordability as decarbonization
efforts continue.
New England Power Generators Association President Dan Dolan,
during the Connecticut Business & Industry Association’s 2024 Energy & Environment
Conference, gave an overview of the region’s power generation outlook, and what
Northeast states need to do in the coming years as the country continues to
hone in on renewable and clean energy alternatives.
He said there’s “incredible economic opportunity” in the
energy sector, and investments must be made to meet the region’s future needs.
“Demand is coming — we see a really consistent rise over
time,” Dolan said of energy usage over the next 10 years, which will be driven
by the accelerating electrification of heating systems and transportation.
“Energy efficiency is great, but we’re going to need to produce a whole lot
more.”
Grid outlook
New England is responsible for 2.8% of all carbon dioxide
emissions in the U.S., Dolan said, and much of the region’s energy policy is
driven by decarbonization. Most of those emissions are from commercial and
retail heating and transportation, he said, and “opportunistic electrification”
in the transportation and heating industries can help the region continue its
focus on renewable energy.
However, that will also drive up energy demand. To meet
those needs, decarbonization must be a multifaceted effort, he said. While
alternative energy options like solar and wind have had a lot of time in the
spotlight recently, Dolan emphasized the need to continue to support existing
clean energy sources like hydro and nuclear as decarbonization efforts grow
over the next several years.
“We need every ounce of the clean energy that is on the
planning board right now and that we expect to continue to be financed and
developed, but we also need to preserve nearly all of the assets that serve as
the backbone of the system,” Dolan said.
In 2023, 49% of the region’s energy supply came from natural
gas, 20% nuclear, 8% hydro, 10% renewables (such as wind and solar), and 13%
net imports, according to new data from ISO New England.
Notably absent from that list are coal and oil, which
combined for less than 0.5% of megawatt hours in the region in 2023.
“That is a dramatic shift over the last 15 to 20 years that
has created remarkable emissions benefits for the region,” Dolan said.
At the CBIA event, ISO New England’s Lead State Policy
Advisor for External Affairs Kerry Schlichting gave an overview of the
region’s future expected power grid breakdown. According to projections from
ISO New England, the total electricity production breakdown in 2040 will be:
56% renewables; 13% nuclear; 12% natural gas; 3% hydro; and 16% imports. No
electricity is expected to come from coal or oil by then, she said.
Dolan said ultimately, decarbonization needs to be a
national effort, but states like Connecticut, and New England as a region, can
help lead.
“I remain hugely optimistic that we are going to find our
way through this, but getting to those three legs of the stool — reliability,
affordability and decarbonization — we can do two out of three of those pretty
directly and easily. The real challenge is doing all three at once,” Dolan
said.