MSBA Visits Mount Greylock Regional To Study Building

By Andy McKeeveriBerkshires Staff
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The state School Building Authority visited Williamstown last Thursday to see first hand the multitude of problems Mount Greylock Regional School needs to repair.
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The state School Building Authority spent a few hours doing a "senior study" at Mount Greylock Regional High School last week, which the organization does only for schools consider a priority.

School officials and members of the Building Subcommittee were questioned for more than an hour about the school's statement of interest and later took MSBA officials and their consultants on a tour.

School officials are hoping to get accepted into the state program that pays a large share of the cost for building new or renovating current schools as well providing expertise on the building process.

"They wanted to explore a little more in depth about items in the statement of interest," said School Committee Chairman Robert Ericson on Tuesday. "They were kind of tough. They asked some serious questions."

MSBA officials wanted to see and understand the issues with the school first hand — rather than taking the school's word for it — as part of their due diligence for deciding which schools get invited into the program. The MSBA's website clearly says the study is "not approval of a project," and more information about the study is available.

According to Ericson, the MSBA Board will be voting on which districts are accepted into the program at its Oct. 3 and Nov. 16 meetings. If accepted, the school will need to formally join, establish a building committee (which they basically already have) and start getting the paperwork in line for a feasibility study.

"Out of [the feasibility study] come a determination of the size, shape and criteria," Ericson said.


Among the school's problems is dampness, which caused cracks in the floor tiles, poor air quality and a constant need to replace ceiling tiles.
The visit is not quite a sign of clarification for school officials, who have been debating the extent of doing repairs on their own. While the district is not yet invited into the process, the visit shows the state recognizes a need.

But, school officials do not know when any construction could begin so the Building Subcommittee is still going to decide what to fix and how much to spend.

"If we are invited, it is a resolution. If not, we have to look at spending more money to fix things," Ericson said. "The question is how we will stack up against other schools."

MSBA received a total of 280 statements of interest for 121 school districts this year — though many of those are repair projects. The organization will prioritize the state's building needs and support what project it can.

"The fact that we got selected to be analyzed is a positive sign," Ericson said. "I think they got a lot of good explanations on the issues."

According to the MSBA calendar, the organization performed a dozen senior studies in June and a half dozen in July. The study at Mount Greylock was set up in about two weeks, Ericson said.

The meeting was attended by two members of the MSBA with two consultants, Superintendent of Schools Rose Ellis, Ericson, Building Subcommittee members David Backus, Jesse Wirtes and Business Manager David Donoghue.

Ellis did not return phone calls placed to her office on Tuesday afternoon.

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Mount Greylock School Committee Votes Slight Increase to Proposed Assessments

By Stephen DravisiBerkshires Staff
WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass. — The Mount Greylock Regional School Committee on Thursday voted unanimously to slightly increase the assessment to the district's member towns from the figures in the draft budget presented by the administration.
 
The School Committee opted to lower the use of Mount Greylock's reserve account by $70,000 and, instead, increase by that amount the share of the fiscal year 2025 operating budget shared proportionally by Lanesborough and Williamstown taxpayers.
 
The budget prepared by the administration and presented to the School Committee at its annual public hearing on Thursday included $665,000 from the district's Excess and Deficiency account, the equivalent of a municipal free cash balance, an accrual of lower-than-anticipated expenses and higher-than-anticipated revenue in any given year.
 
That represented a 90 percent jump from the $350,000 allocated from E&D for fiscal year 2024, which ends on June 30. And, coupled with more robust use of the district's tuition revenue account (7 percent more in FY25) and School Choice revenue (3 percent more), the draw down on E&D is seen as a stopgap measure to mitigate a spike in FY25 expenses and an unsustainable budgeting strategy long term, administrators say.
 
The budget passed by the School Committee on Thursday continues to rely more heavily on reserves than in years past, but to a lesser extent than originally proposed.
 
Specifically, the budget the panel approved includes a total assessment to Williamstown of $13,775,336 (including capital and operating costs) and a total assessment to Lanesborough of $6,425,373.
 
As a percentage increase from the FY24 assessments, that translates to a 3.90 percent increase to Williamstown and a 3.38 percent increase to Lanesborough.
 
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