Mount Greylock Building Committee Adds Renovation Option
 Mount Greylock School Building Committee checks out the basement of MCLA's Murdock Hall, part of a tour of the building. The committee's architects, Design Partnership of Cambridge, did the renovation of the historic building. |
At its most recent meeting, the committee moved forward two addition/renovation plans and one new building design, the minimum required at this stage of the Massachusetts School Building Authority's feasibility study.
But on Thursday, Design Partnership came to the committee with an add/reno idea that it developed since that June 4 meeting — a design that is a hybrid of the two that the committee already approved.
The new option preserves more of the existing junior-senior high school building while adding a new two-story classroom wing at the front of the school to replace the majority of the current classroom space.
Design Partnership actually offered two such "hybrid" plans.
Both would have preserved the school's current gymnasium, auditorium, mechanicals and other common space. But one put the new classroom wing off the back (west side of the building) while the other runs the new classrooms off the front (east) side of the existing school.
The committee members favored the plan that put the classrooms in front of the building because it would be easier to phase; the new construction in the preferred plan is more removed from the current classrooms.
The district's owner's project manager told the committee that the MSBA would not object adding a fourth design to the three it already moved into this phase of the feasibility study.
"I've had a discussion with MSBA and informed them that we as a team had been taking feedback and felt we didn't have a middle ground," Trip Elmore of Dore and Whittier Management Partners said, referring to the extremes of the two add/renos approved on June 4.
"This was our attempt to find a middle ground. And [MSBA] applauded that.
"They expect the design to evolve, which is what this is. They won't be shocked because I talk to them every week. MSBA is fully aware of everything we're doing on a daily basis."
Elmore also on Thursday advised the committee to consider using a "construction manager-at-risk" if and when the project reaches a construction phase.
The CM-at-risk model of public construction is relatively new in Massachusetts and provides municipalities with more certainty in the construction process.
The CM-at-risk is the legal equivalent of a general contractor, but unlike a conventional general contractor, the CM-at-risk acts more like a member of the project team and, significantly, goes into construction with a negotiated guaranteed maximum price for the project.
"You get this player on board at a very early stage, before you lock and load your deal with the state," Elmore said. "You have someone to say, 'Can we live within this budget and give you what you want?' They come on as a team member."
As Elmore explained it to the committee, the downside of the CM-at-risk model is that it is an added cost that raises a project's price tag on Day One. The upside is that it is more likely to produce an on-time and on-budget project that avoids some of the litigation that sometimes occurs with the traditional "design, bid, build" model.
Design Partnership's Dan Colli backed up Elmore's argument.
"We've been doing school projects for 30 years and for many years, CM-at-risk was not an option," Colli said. "Trip is right. You could get into a situation right away where you end up arguing all the way.
"With a CM ... they would own the phasing of the project. We would help them, but they would own the phasing. If something went wrong, they'd have to absorb that and make it work."
Elmore said he would advise the Mount Greylock School Committee to employ an CM-at-risk whether it went with an add/reno project or new construction.
He also mentioned that the MSBA favors the CM-at-risk model by offering an extra reimbursement point to districts that go that route, an argument that resonated with the committee.
In the end, the committee voted unanimously to begin the process of identifying and interviewing CM-at-risk firms. The decision to add another add/reno design also was unanimous.
But Thursday's meeting was not without some disagreement among the committee members.
The question that caused some division: the location of the panel's next meeting.
Chairman Mark Schiek told the committee that he planned to hold its July 9 meeting at Lanesborough Elementary School in an effort to foster a sense of inclusiveness with Lanesborough residents.
"It behooves us to try to reach as many community members as possible," said Schiek, who added later that Lanesborough residents had asked him to hold a meeting in the regional school district's other member town.
Committee members Hugh Daley and Carrie Greene objected to the plan.
"By doing that, you're undermining the overall point that this is Lanesborough's high school, too," said Daley, a member of the Williamstown Board of Selectmen.
Daley said that at a time when the School Building Committee is facing a number of key decisions in a compressed time frame, the committee should strive for consistency in its meeting schedule, not "hopscotch" between the two towns.
"It's not a territorial thing," argued Greene, the chairman of the Mount Greylock School Committee. "It's more that [the school] is the appropriate venue."
Greene pointed out that the School Committee, which created the School Building Committee, does not rotate its meetings between the two towns but holds every meeting at the school itself.
Richard Cohen, a member of the School Committee and, like Schiek, a Lanesborough resident, said holding one meeting in Lanesborough would be an important gesture to the town's residents.
"Having one of the next three or four meetings in Lanesborough won't take us off the track," Cohen said. "Any symbolic gesture ...
"Symbolism and illogic at this point in the process is a step backward," Daley said.
Schiek invited the committee members to make a motion to vote down his idea, but no one did, and after the spirited discussion he reaffirmed his intention to schedule the July 9 meeting in Lanesborough.
"The reality is we may have an empty room as we often do at these meetings," Schiek said.
Thursday's meeting did feature one contributor from the floor.
Lanesborough Town Administrator Paul Sieloff asked to address the committee to recommend that it work harder to lower the cost of a prospective building project.
Referring to the rough estimates Elmore offered at the June 4 meeting, Sieloff noted that the new building design favored by the committee is projected to cost $20 million more than a recently completed "similar size" school in Maynard.
"All the excellent work done here is worth zero if you can't get [the building project] approved in the towns," Sieloff said.
"I recognize the quality you're searching for. But if we can't get the votes out of the two towns, we end up with nothing."
Schiek noted that the Maynard project and Mount Greylock are not completely analogous but agreed that Sieloff had a valid point.
"We have to be cognizant of the fact that we're asking a lot of the taxpayers and have to make this as palatable as possible," Schiek said.
Thursday's committee business started with a site visit to North Adams, where Design Partnership of Cambridge was the designer on the restoration of historic Murdock Hall on the campus of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts.
MCLA Vice President for Administration and Finance James Stakenas led a tour of the building and shared some insights into the nuts and bolts of a renovation project.
"It was very helpful to see what a truly renovated space looks like," Daley said later during the meeting. "It's not just a coat of paint. You're sitting in a new building inside old walls."
Tags: MGRHS, school building committee, school project,
