 Okay, so good afternoon everybody and welcome to our Amherst community chat for Thursday, February 17. We've taken a little bit of a break from this format but we're back in 2022 with our Amherst community chats. So today. Well, first of all my name is Brianna Sunrid communications manager and community participation officer for the town of Amherst and joining your town manager Paul welcome in and I today are Kathy Shane district one counselor and chair of the elementary school building committee and Allison McDonald's the Amherst school committee chair. Thank you both for joining us and thank you all who are in the room today. Before I let our guests introduce themselves, I just wanted to remind that we welcome live questions in the room today. You can do so by raising your hand in zoom or pressing star nine if you're joining us from a phone, or you can use the q amp a function to type your questions and we will make sure that your questions gets asked to our guests. Without further ado, I'd like to welcome Kathy and Allison to briefly introduce themselves before we get to your questions. Thanks, Brianna said I'm a town counselor and in that role I'm also on the school elementary school building committee which is a committee. When we're full of 13 members and we work with the designer and the owners project manager on the details of the project after the school committee does its work. We'll be working early on and we'll be working throughout the project until it reaches its end. And I'm Allison McDonald and I'm a member and chair of the Amherst elementary school committee. And I know that there's some confusion because there's multiple school committees in our, in our region. So the Amherst school committee is the five member school committee charged with overseeing our elementary school district which is what this school building project is addressing. Happy to be here and answer, hopefully answer some of your questions. And Paul anything you want to say before we get to questions. No, just thank you. I'm glad we're starting these up again they're always useful. They create a nice archive that you'll talk about I'm sure Brianna. So I'm Paul Backelman the town manager and we welcome and thankful for our guests for making the time to be here. This is, you know, we're launching on some significant new projects for the town, including the Jones library in the elementary school building long duration to get them up and running. But we're in the heat of it now so it's really exciting to be moving forward. So thanks everybody for making the time to be here. Great, thank you all and just a quick reminder for those who just joined recently please put your questions into the q amp a or raise your hand so we can hear from you live via zoom. So we have some questions that were submitted to us previously but we've got one that just came live into the room from one of our attendees. Can you tell us whether the education plan describes how education is currently provided, or is it an aspirational describing new programs. Thank you. I'm going to take that that question. The education plan just generically in a building project describes the education program or education services that the district would like to provide in the new in the school building project. So in our particular case, our, we have a draft education plan, the school committee continues to review it and ask questions, and we'll continue to look at that on on Tuesday. This coming Tuesday the 22nd, and we'll vote on it on our first meeting in March which is March 8. And that plan as the draft that we have today is really based on the program that the programs and services that we are currently providing in our elementary school district so across Fort River and Wildwood. It also describes services and programming that the district that is district wide and will be also in this in this particular school building. So we're going to call it aspirational other than it's it's projecting and continuing the same high quality services that we're providing today for all of our students. Great, thank you Allison. We have another question here which is a great thing to key up at the beginning of this. We have a question here where are we in the process and when do you think we will actually get the new school. Allison take that we are in a period called a feasibility study, which is an intense part of the project. We will be submitting to the granting authority, hopefully by the middle of March, up to seven different options, including where will the school be, will it be all new will it be an ad reno. No decision will be made about those but then we move into the next period which is between March and June we will pick the place the preferred option. Then we move into the designer that we hear is the designer, what's in the school what does it look like where are the rooms. How is it built, and we hope to have that done, so that we can have good solid cost estimates by the end of the year. At that point we need to go out to taxpayers and back to the town's council to finance it. We're hoping it will be open in 2026 we're saying the fall of 2026, it's possible the spring of 2026, but it depends on the length of time of the construction. One of the things you mentioned Kathy is a question we've been getting a lot it's been asked a few times, at least preparing for this is where the school will be and how and when does that get decided as part of the process. We're working with two possible locations, I think as most people know I hope people, most people know we're going from three schools down to two. So we're going to be combining 575 children who are currently in elementary K through fifth grade. It'll either be at Wildwood or Fort River and what the design team is now doing and we won't make that decision to June. What we're doing right now is looking at the conditions of the building the conditions of the soil, the land to figure out whether one site works better for the school we want. Then the other and that has to do with the size of the school where we can put the school, how it would be built. Another thing I'll say they're looking at which is quite interesting is traffic patterns, you know, thinking of the the buses will have to come from the south of Amherst and the north of Amherst to the school. What what patterns would one site be better or worse, and those are all not one way or the other way but those all get balanced to the decision on which is the preferred site. We have a question here for any of our guests to answer but what fraction of the likely construction cost will be to make this facility net zero. And if you could just give a quick explainer about what net zero means. We have a net zero we have a net zero bylaw but it's got two major pieces in it that we move off of oil and gas for the heating source and we move basically to an electric building. And then we offset the cost of that with renewables which can be, which would be most likely photovoltaic some areas might use windmills. I think we'll have that. So the, the intention of the designer is to make this an extremely energy efficient building so whether we do an ad reno where part of the building is renovating what we have now and adding to it, or an all new. We can build an energy efficient building. And since the building has to have the same heating and electrical and air conditioning systems, all of those will be operating in the building and then the question is, can we get to net zero where we completely offset the cost we have some leeway in the bylaw, but the intention would be to get as close as possible. Meaning that we get as many credits for renewables as the electrical cost so we don't have costs in the building. Yeah, Paul. Yeah, and I think you know I think there's a lot of excitement about making this a net zero building, because that's just one of the things that we believe in as a community we have a bylaw in fact that supports that. One of the problems is that the mass school building authority doesn't accommodate that very easily financially. So there are no really rewards for moving aggressively into net zero. We want them to change that formula because we think towns who are moving forward towards net zero should be compensated for that, at least on a percentage basis, but I think amongst the building committee and every all the elected officials, if we you know the net zero piece of is an important part of this project. And I just want to underscore what the designer had said, you know, the building no matter what in terms of its envelope the way we insulated the roof will be looking to be extremely energy efficient so be low on the use of energy, which is critical to even be able to achieve net zero we can't be energy hogs with leaky windows, leaky floors leaky rules. And so that the designer we have has built net zero building and has a very high reputation for its ability to think this through. Thank you. We got another question that's come in through the Q&A and this may be more for Allison but let me read it and see if that's the case. Somebody asking if you could clarify the March 8 school committee vote, how this relates to the education plan and estimated costs, and how this relates to March 8 vote, and what will be forward to the MSBA via the school committee vote. I hope that was clear. And at least start start the response and maybe Kathy could jump in, if I miss anything or gaps but the school committee meeting. The school committee is responsible for developing the education plan or the educational program that will be housed within the project. And that is what what we are currently working on. As mentioned we have that draft and continue to take input and feedback and questions from the community as well as ourselves that we're asking questions of the district and the designer in that plan. The vote on March 8 is on the educational program. We will have rough, I think, well, the building committee will have rough cost ranges for sort of the footprint of that building, but the school committee purview is solely on the education program. The education program absolutely drives the space that is needed to deliver that. And that space plan is derived from the education program as well as standards set by the MSBA as well as design standards that the experts that are at Denisco design are using to sort of construct that that square footage plan. I think I don't know if I answered that question completely and Kathy. I'll just come in and so you've got the building committee over as the partner of the school committee with different roles. We will, we expect to see at this point once there is an education plan, as Alison said that informs the space. We expect to see the first round of cost estimates on the fourth and we're actually looking at seven different options. We have Fort River, renovate, add Renault new, and we will have a range of cost estimates then without any decisions. What the granting authority wants us to submit in this preliminary divine fate is the education plan signed off that this is the range of options that signed off, and then there will be a supporting document on the building conditions the soil conditions, what it will take to build the building, the designer will do that all is part of the report. So they need to sign off on that range before we can then what we will continue to work but then we move from that that that's an acceptable range and we've done our initial homework on this. Our vote isn't until on that on that whole package. So educational plan, the other pieces were scheduled to be voting on that on the 11th of March. You know so we're going to get a preliminary look on the fourth and a vote on the 11th. So we have a couple of follow up questions here back on the net zero concept. So one question from the room is, does Paul statement mean that MSBA won't contribute to some of the net zero costs. And also we've got another question about whether or not there's been schools in Massachusetts that have received received net zero status. Okay, I can, I can add to both Paul, they, at least at this date and we hope it changes they won't pay for the PV panels the solar, solar Baltic. And for some of the site preparation costs such as that decision has not been made but if we go to geothermal and we dig the wells. They limit the amount they will pay for any ground and site work to no more than 8% of the total cost to the project, irrespective of what is you want to do which is very interesting because I've been to three webinars they put on a net zero schools where they're promoting them, and all of them had photovoltaic and geothermal. So those two pieces they don't pay for in full. So geothermal they would pay for part of it because the actual system is what's heating and cooling the building, but they don't pay for the site work part of it. And I forget what the other part of the question was on whether or not there have been a net zero school in Massachusetts. There are multiple there are multiple I haven't added them all up, but we had eight designers nine designers I'm going to have to double check. And we had set as a goal that they would have experienced every one of them had at least one net zero school the several of them have net zero elementary schools. And throughout Massachusetts they're increasingly what's interesting is each one says we're the we're the first, and I'm going to wait a minute. There was one a year earlier there's a point but this has become because of the intense interest in climate action, if you move to electric electric will normally be more expensive than the way we're running our schools now so I want to emphasize that as the are our consultants are saying it's how you build the school is the first part, you know, what systems you put in it to heat and those are another part how you use the building do you leave the lights on all day or do you turn them off when you leave the room, and then at the end, how you offset your electrical costs so all of that is part of getting to a super efficient and not using fossil fuels. I should know. I mean, Kathy, Kathy's done a tremendous amount of work she's she with former counselor Steve striper who was on the building committee at the time actually went to Lexington I think it was to visit and that zero energy. And she's been visiting other buildings to talk to the occupants is he house at working talk to the maintenance people house at working and so, and the other building committee members are doing that as well so I think that that's a really important thing we want to learn as much as we possibly can, so that we build the one that's going to work for us. All right, we've got a lot of questions coming in from the room so I'm going to try to pick through some of these. So the, I'll answer them as they were asked so I've heard people say that the town council recently awarded 1 million for the feasibility please confirm or clarify. Yes, so the town had appropriate $750,000 for design services back in 2020 I think it was. And then recently, when we got the full cost of what it was going to cost to do to the design, we went back to the town council and they appropriate another $280,000 give or take to complete the design of the project. And this is because there were some things that we thought we could have used from the previous Fort River study that were not usable. And also because it was important we felt to update the traffic plan because we thought that was the last traffic plan was not done at a level that would have been satisfactory to the community and there were some other elements in it but those were some sort of the big ticket items that we had to take into account. Kathy is anything you want to add to that. No, no, and you know it's, you know, we've got two sites now and geothermal is one of the issues so a lot more. We didn't have enough information on one of the sites Wildwood to know whether that is it feasible, where can we put the wells. So this is the kind of the building in site condition they're doing a pretty thorough job to be able to give us decent estimates. And I would say, you know what, if I think from their perspective is they want to stand by their estimates so they wanted to make sure they were up to date they were 2022, not, you know, four years old or two years old. Yeah. So we have a hand from one of our attendees in the room, I am going to invite Rudy to unmute and introduce themselves. Hi, Rudy Park and I'm an Amherst resident over in North Amherst. And this is sort of the Kathy, the geothermal when you visited the different schools or the Lexington school and talk to the maintenance folks. What was their take on the, the maintenance ease on the geothermal and did they have also air to air up on the roof ERF systems and could they compare them. There's one question on that and then did MSBA expressly say ever that they wouldn't cover the geothermal wells, are we making an assumption. And if, if they will only cover part, will they cover, like, just the equipment in the well or will they cover the digging of the well and the piping. What will they cover. I'm just trying to figure out how much is actually excluded in the site cost if we go to the geothermal thanks. Okay, I, I will answer to the best of my ability the questions Rudy. And the first, when I visited the Lexington school, yes, we actually went into the room where these, you know, you know what you would have seen I'd never seen what it looks like to operate a building with geothermal these giant plastic pipes were in there. And the maintenance people said what the designer had done is made it incredibly simple for them they have a panel. They know what everything does they can operate it in different ways, and that they had gotten a lot of training at the beginning, and they simplified the system so they find did not find it to be they were in a rocket science world and had to retrain everything they knew, which was relieving I don't know about air to air my, my impression. They have their this whole school had both photovoltaics all over the parking lot. They're very visible. I don't know about air to air. I literally just don't know the answer to that. So geothermal, we weren't told that MSBA won't pay for geothermal per se, it's that they limit to 8% the cost of the site work, compared to the total project. But what it costs you to do the site part of it, you're limited to 8% so it wasn't that they're ruling out geothermal just that if the site work that we had to do to get to geothermal was more than 8% that's the part they don't do so. It's not like photovoltaics where they just don't make it an eligible costs it's not they're ruling out geothermal on equipment. They will pay for the part of the system that's inside the building. So I'm not sure where the dividing line is the two and it's a great question that I have written down to get an answer to. So thank you for asking it. Great, thank you Rudy for your question. So the questions that have been sent into the Q&A so I'll ask this one next in order of coming in is the total gross square footage submitted to the MSBA on March 15 locked in. So that what is sent then will be the square footage that is built. This is my first time through so my impression is that it sets an upward limit, upward limit, you know that we wouldn't go back and say we in fact need more space than that. And I think sometimes what at least on a few places I've seen is sometimes the distribution of that space changes and MSBA actually an Alice and you might want to weigh in. They will look at the decisions we've made and they are basically a second opinion and you might describe how they look at this. I think it's by no means locked in I like the analogy of a second opinion because that's really what it is is we put together the education plan that drives the space plan. If we've made decisions in and the designer is using MSBA standards as well as others sort of industry standards for space required for the activity. So that's something that needs to happen. And if by any chance we've made decisions in that process that MSBA in their second opinion review believes that we've, we should have less space for X or more space for why then what we've put in there, we will get that in the next stage. So, you know, some decisions that we made may change based on that second opinion feedback and their expert review of the design plan that we've put together. They won't necessarily give feedback and ask us to change the education program, though that may be that there may be sort of that sort of compromise it's going to be more focused on sort of how if we build built a plan, a plan to deliver the education program that we've set out for this particular project. And they also go to Desi, you know, so Desi looks at the children Desi Desi is Department of elementary and secondary education, which is a separate agency in the state government agency and that agency will weigh in looking at the the children we're taking care of, you know, serving and teaching so it's not every child is the same so the programs we're running. And MSBA will usually defer to Desi around children that aren't that may have special needs educational needs other kinds of needs so that the two of them. And you can see feedback I looked at the earlier project, the Wildwood RCA combination. There was lots of questions and feedback that I, you know, you might want to do this here you might want to do this there are lots of comments it wasn't just a thank you very much. It was questions and answers back and forth. Just to sort of put a finer point on it is when Desi does that review if we've made decisions in our education program that are not delivering to cafes point and sort of the level of support and services that we need to be providing for our particular population. They will make that give us that feedback so you know as we build our education plan we can't be making decisions that that won't necessarily pass through that sort of Desi and MSBA review and if we do then we will get that feedback at that stage. Thank you Alison it's hard to believe that almost 30 minutes has already gone by. So we are coming up to our 30 minutes there's a couple more questions in the room that I want to try to get to our guests and allow them a moment for some final thoughts so I'm going to go ahead and try to get through some of these questions. The education plan will council be asked for its endorsement of or at least its input on the education plan as the plan drives the cost of the project and the funding plan is council's responsibility. So I just like to frame this a little bit to understand roles and responsibilities so the school committee which is a body of elected officials has responsibility for the education plan and overseeing the education of our children. Council which is a body of elected officials is responsible for the finances and you know without in both bodies need to be in agreement on you know the on the project, the council will be asked to both appropriate the funds to borrow the funds and to put a question on the ballot so voters will vote whether they want to support it or not so council is a very key player. And then the school building committee has representatives from both the school committee and the council on it, plus other, you know superintendent town manager finance director and members of the public. And so that has a unique role in terms of moving the project forward. So all three bodies have to work in concert. But each one, the council can make its decision as it sees fit and the school committee can make its decision as it sees fit. That's how I see this sort of laid out. Okay, I'm going to nest a couple of these last question questions to hit as many as we can. A couple more follow ups on the net zero process. Are there plans right now for using a portion of the school grounds for solar array whether or not it's reimbursable. Yes. And the second question is just a clarification on that 8% Kathy that you mentioned about how much could be spent on site work and this person is asking is it of the total construction cost is that the 8% Yes. Just, just a quick, you know, I didn't mean to self flip on Polo Polo on both of our potential sites. There is a potential to put it over parking lots to potentially put it on the roof, or potential if it's wide open fields, put it on the fields, you know, up on options. And that will be factored into when I said we're at the comparison phase here are some options. And my understanding is we will get feedback on here are your options, you know, rather than we've made a decision but that is being looked at as part of the design. Thank you for that information. So as we are at our half hour, I do want to allow our guests to have final thoughts or calls to action that they want to share but just as a quick reminder this is being recorded we will put it up on our community chat playlist. Shortly, a little bit later this afternoon so if you wanted to share it with any friends or neighbors. You'll see that today. So Allison any Allison Kathy Paul any last thoughts. Oh, you go first Kathy. No go ahead Allison go ahead. Okay. I, I understood, as I mentioned earlier probably at the start of this the school committee is going to be meeting on Tuesday evening, Tuesday this February 22. And a big chunk of our meeting agenda will be to continue discussions and questions asking about the education plan so I encourage all folks to tune into that. So the meeting materials will likely be posted. If not before the weekend and soon soon thereafter so folks will have a chance to sort of look at work that's been done and any alternatives that have been developed since the last time that we looked at it based on the the school committee had last time, and as mentioned we will be voting on the eighth and I believe there's a community forum between now and then. So there will be another opportunity for a community to weigh in and ask questions. So I just wanted in case people don't know there is a website for the project it's Amherst dash school dash project calm. And we put up. We took a first shot at frequently asked questions with answers. And as we've heard some of these we might, we can expand on that that for the people who are interested in the materials were seeing including the net zero presentations. We have created a subcommittee of the building committee. Everything is up on the town's website. So if you go to the elementary school building committee, you'll see a separate set of net zero so where people were explaining this phase, the envelope and pieces I have, and that's where the presentations are going to be made on what we can do and what the findings are on solar geothermal. So I encourage you those materials we're putting them up, trying to put them up as soon as we get them, depending on Kathy to remember to make that final step that committee gets them right away. And so we meet tomorrow, and we'll be getting some more information from the designer but they really are out on the field working hard on this so we're learning as we go. And I can't tell you how exciting it is I, it's, it's a thrill to be at this point, because I think we have the potential of a terrific school that will make us all proud both for our kids and for our community. So I'll throw in, you know, we're trying to do the best we can to make as many things available on the website and a special site website. It's really complex, I mean, it's almost like choose your own adventure if you want to be really into the solar stuff. You can go there if you looking at enrollment or design you can go there. Community engagement is really key to it and so we're trying to do is work on community engagement as well, or else you might mention this brand about engage Amherst and so. So I think, you know, trying to help organize the information it's a mammoth amount of information that you know Kathy has just consumed so much like it's amazing that that we're trying to make sure it's readable understandable to the public in general. So I think a good place to start for some of the materials Paul Kathy and Allison mentioned is Amherst MA dot gov slash ESBC that's the elementary school building committees page where it has all the meeting materials but also links to the project website and beyond. So that's just to start to access some of those bits of information. I do want to thank the 17 live attendees that we've had today for joining us. And again, this will be posted shortly in case you want to review anything or share it with friends if you had a question that came up you didn't get a chance to ask please email us at info at Amherst MA dot gov. Otherwise I want to thank Allison Kathy Paul and all of you for joining us today. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for hosting us. Thanks for having a nice day.