CHATHAM – At the recent special town meeting, a puddle that formed in the Monomoy Regional Middle School gymnasium became a focus for opponents of a new council on aging building. If the town can’t even take care of its school buildings, they said, why add yet another structure to inventory?
Those who attended the meeting may recall that heavy, wind-driven rain fell on the evening of Sept. 18. A subsequent investigation by school officials found that the water on the gym floor was not the result of a roof leak, but a consequence of wind pushing rain from exactly the right direction into the building through a vent.
That doesn’t mean, however, the building doesn’t need attention. Both the middle and elementary schools last received major makeovers more than 20 years ago.
“The exterior’s in good shape in terms of the roof, but it’s also aging,” Superintendent Scott Carpenter said of the middle school. The town’s roofing contractor, Cazeault Roofing, was called to the middle school to caulk gaps in the vent and examine it and other vents to make sure they are not leaking.
Roofs on both schools, however, are beyond their 20-year life expectancy — 26 years at the middle school and 27 at the elementary school. They will need replacement in the not too distant future. Both buildings are owned by the town but are leased to the Monomoy Regional School District under a 20-year agreement which began in 2012. According to the regional agreement, the cost of capital projects such as a new roof are funded by the district’s two towns, Chatham and Harwich. Each town covers all costs for its own elementary school, which middle school costs are based on each town’s enrollment.
The district will be submitting an application to the Massachusetts School Building Authority’s Accelerated Repair Program for funding to replace the roofs and other infrastructure, according to Carpenter. When that will happen is uncertain, however; he said cost overruns on school building projects caused the MSBA to pause the accelerated repair program for the past three years. He was “cautiously optimistic” that the state will refund the program.
“Clearly we’re at that point and have been planning on getting in the queue,” he said. Because the program has been on hiatus, however, the queue may be long, he warned.
A previous estimate for replacing the middle school roof was in the $1 million range, Carpenter said, and slightly less for the elementary school.
A budget presentation last spring listed the expected useful life of various elements of the district’s four buildings as well as the age of existing facilities. The boilers at the middle school and Chatham Elementary School, for instance, have a life expectancy of 20 years but are both 26 years old. Windows at the middle school are 26 years old; at the elementary school, 27 years old. Generators at the elementary school are 26 years old and 27 years old at the middle school. Both windows and generators have a 20-year life expectancy.
The high school is 10 years old, so school officials will have to think about planning for replacing many of its elements in the next few years, Carpenter said.
Every summer interior sections of the older schools are redone, with new flooring, for instance. “We try to do some projects and keep some within the operating budget,” he said.
Despite some interest in the community of converting the elementary school into a center for active living due to decreasing enrollment, Carpenter noted that parents have made it clear that they want the town to retain its elementary school. Because of discrepancies in funding of the two elementary schools — Harwich was paying a large portion of Chatham’s costs — a recent change in the regional agreement stipulated that each town covers the operating expenses of its own elementary school. Chatham agreed to increase school funding to do that, and dedicated a percentage of the short-term rental tax to help cover the cost.
If the building were to be turned over to the town, there would be no state support to replace the roof or other infrastructure, he added.
The district stays on top of roof leaks, and some damage in the past has been covered by insurance. If leaks in the middle school gym were a regular thing, the floor would show it, Carpenter said, although, in an email to Moderator William Litchfield about the special town meeting situation, acknowledge that “water dripping from the ceiling on anyone isn’t a good look, even if it is only a small leak.”