NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — McCann Technical School is preparing for a major overhaul of its 30-year-old roof and 60-year-old single-pane windows and will be shifting the school calendar to accommodate the project.

 

The vocational school was invited into the Massachusetts School Building Authority's accelerated repair program last fall. 

 

Superintendent James Brosnan told the School Committee on Thursday that 16 designers and engineers from Gale Associates spent three days in the school during April vacation assessing the project. 

 

"We did roof cuts, we did masonry cuts. We did all the examinations," he said. "We had sent them a tremendous amount of material ahead of time, electronically. I want to thank both [facilities manager] Gary Pierce and [CAD instructor] Greg King for having the files we could send electronically."

 

Staff also pulled the original drawings 1961-2 and from 1969 and 1974 additions, which were so brittle the crew had to take cameral images of them. 

 

"They did an awful lot of that research and an awful lot of physical evaluation to build up the recommendations," said Brosnan, who added that he and staff will go through the incoming reports and the facilities subcommittee will meet with owner's project manager LiRo-Hill, appointed by the MSBA, and Gale representatives in early June.

 

"They're going to make a presentation to the facilities group about here's where we are on the project. Here are the recommendation points. Here are the items that we can ask questions, make designs, make decisions, which way do you want to go?" said Brosnan. "At that point, they'll also have some dollar amounts, because right now we don't know, and I'm not going to guess, because that's just going to send everybody over the wrong edge."

 

He expected the full plan and cost figures will be ready for the School Committee's June meeting, when it will vote to submit the package to the MSBA by June 26. The MSBA board will meet on Aug. 27 and, if approved, the district will have 60 days to get approval from all nine member communities. 

 

The superintendent said it won't be a surprise because he has been alerting community officials that this is coming. Each community will be required to authorize the full amount of the borrowing but "we're going to receive 64 percent reimbursement for the project at MSBA. That's about as high as it gets," said Brosnan. 

 

"Assuming everything's going through, assuming all nine communities support, assuming everything is we're going to do this, I will be looking next year at a schedule that we might mobilize and begin the roof project latter April, May, June, and windows through the summer into the fall," he said, adding that the three weeks early on will be "critical to the project."

 

The plan is for teachers to come back to school on Aug. 21-22 this year and students on Monday, Aug. 25. If no snow days are used, school will end June 5, 2026. The teachers union had voted on Wednesday last week to accept the calendar; the committee approved it on Thursday.

 

"I've deleted two professional development days during the year," said Brosnan. "What that does is automatically get us seven days out earlier in June. Hope we don't get a lot of snow days."

 

School Committee members were optimistic on the member communities approving the project, with Daniel Maloney noting the investment made to maintain McCann and how there were schools younger than MCann that have had to be torn down and rebuilt.

 

Brosnan posited it could cost between $275 million and $300 million to replace the 1962 school, while the roof and window project will extend its life for another 50 years — and improve its energy efficiency. 

 

"We haven't asked the towns for anything," said William Craig. "The gymnasium [floor] was on the very end of the assessments to the towns when I came on board, 10-12 years ago. ... We haven't really done that, and yet, we can point to all the good we've done to improve our buildings and our school without going back and saying we need this in addition to our normal operating budget.

 

"... We've been good shepherds of their investment."

 

Chair Gary Rivers added, "I think it's really important to reiterate the HVAC building, we just put up a new building at no cost to the communities."

 

In other business: 

 

• The committee welcomed new members Stephanie Melito of Adams and Tessa DiLego of Lanesborough, recently elected in their respective town elections.

 

• Brosnan read a letter from the Dalton Historical Commission thanking the McCann carpentry students for the "perfect" shed they built for the Fitch-Hoose House. 

 

• The committee accepted an $18,000 grant from the Gene Haas Foundation. Haas Automation Inc. is a manufacturer of machine tools and the grant can be used for scholarships, teacher and student training, sponsorships, conferences, equipment and materials. 

 

"This is not our first one but it's a very significant grant and we're very grateful," said Brosnan. 

 

• Principal Justin Kratz noted that the baseball, softball and boys' lacrosse teams are ranked in the top 20 in their division statewide; five students are attending the national SkillsUSA competition in Orlando, Fla., and two postsecondery students are going to Atlanta; that the National Grid training truck was a hit with students last week, and that mock interviews would be continuing this week to prepare students for their first jobs. 

 

• The committee accept the single bids for mowing (Old New England Property Maintenance), pest control (Orkin) and hazardous solutions (Safety-Kleen). 

 

• It also accepted the low bid of $437,500 from North Adams Sheet Metal to replace the ventilation and fan system in the kitchen; and a bid of $102,494.45 from B&G Restaurant Supply for convection oven, double deck oven, steam jacketed tabletop kettle and tilting skillet braising pan. 

 

The board voted to declare the older equipment as surplus; asked if they could be sold, Brosnan said they were old, possibly original, and were difficult to get parts for. He would check before selling for scrap and would reach out to the Berkshire Food Project at committee member Bruce Shepley's request to see if the nonprofit could use any of it.