Bill Bloss' BOE Statement

Statement of William M. Bloss
Chairman, Guilford Board of Education
September 15, 2008

This Board neither can nor should force a new school on an unwilling town. However, the
Board can prevent a willing town from choosing to build a new school by refusing to request
other boards even to allow a vote. I believe that the Board should refuse to allow such a vote
only if a particular proposal is unreasonable. Not only do I think that building a new high school is not unreasonable, I am convinced that it is the most sensible among the alternatives available to us today.

We have struggled with the question of our buildings for years. I have been to something more than 60 or 70 meetings, including more than 20 meetings with parent, church, and community groups. We are at this point not because this is a perfect alternative, but because it carries the fewest risks and the greatest potential benefits.

I take some comfort in the knowledge that our choice is hardly without precedent. A town leader once said to a group of townspeople considering a new high school: “Greater than any building, no matter how well planned or how complete, will always remain the personality, inspiration and efficiency of the teacher. Real teachers are far more important than the most beautifully-shaped and arranged structures in brick or stone, but a building rightly constructed always aids a teaching staff in its work. Such a building is worthy of our calm, matured thought.” Those were the words of Rev. William Moe, the minister of the First Congregational Church, in 1936 when the town was considering the bold step of retiring the Guilford Institute and High School and building a new high school – the present Adams building. The people who he asked to make the commitment for future generations lived in a very different town than today. They were in the depths of the Depression. The future of many of their students did not depend on competing with children in China or India or Singapore. Yet Rev. Moe continued: “This old Institute, built to serve another age with different school ideals now stands inflexible in the midst of a new educational world. In our hands are placed the opportunity and responsibility of building for our growing present and future needs a structure worthy of our best. Shall we as citizens not accept the burning torch lighted by the Founders of this historic structure of eighty years ago and help to carry it on?”

We have relied on our predecessors, going back more than two generations, to build every school in this town. If we do nothing more than light renovations that will add a few years of dreary life to a dreary building, then we will have managed to shift to the next generation a responsibility that I believe is ours. I am committed to making the Guilford schools the best that they can be for a town with our strengths and resources. I cannot support a plan that is built on a foundation that good is good enough.

I have tried very hard to look at this as a cost-benefit analysis. It is very easy to calculate the costs, harder to quantify the benefits. But I have been persuaded by Dr. Forcella’s presentation in July that there is real value to a new building from an educational point of view. I give his views very substantial weight; he has earned that by his work here. These benefits include, among many others:

• Vital improvements will be made to health including air quality
• It will be safer
• A new building will incorporate technological advances that the designers of the existing
high school could not have imagined
• Recruitment and retention of outstanding teachers and staff will be advanced
• It will further the collaborative professional learning communities model of learning
• It will be far more energy efficient
• Life cycle costs for a new building will be far lower than for a renovated building
• And a new school can and should be a community resource, used far more heavily than
our existing building

I am also convinced that the disruption to the educational process from a renovation that could take years to complete is intolerable and unfair to years of students. We do not have empty buildings into which we can move hundreds of students while work is being performed. Our students deserve better from us than having to endure years of study inside a construction site.

Although I think it matters far less, I am also convinced that a new school will improve property values by making the town a more desirable destination for people who can choose to live anywhere in the region, but who choose their town based on our quality of education.

The only real argument against the building is its cost. This is a very reasonable argument, and I do not minimize it. Can we afford it? Clearly we are well within what the state allows us as a town to bond. Under state law we could lawfully bond up to $315 million for school buildings, which we clearly will never do. As a town, we currently have $16 million in indebtedness. We have spent far less on our buildings over the past twenty years than nearly any comparable town in the state. Financing costs are relatively low now, so that the projections by the task force as to the annual tax burden are, if anything, higher than they would likely be. As deeply troubled as the economy is today, I must have faith that by the time any bonds for this project would begin to be due, in 2012, the economy will have significantly improved.

But most importantly, a realistic alternative with no cost does not exist. To me, this is the crucial point. Our choice is not between a new school or doing nothing. It is between building a new school or spending one-third of what a new school would cost to fix the safety and ventilation problems alone, then fixing every other problem inevitable in that building that, before the bonds are paid off, will be 75 years old, all while wondering whether state reimbursement rates will continue to fall and construction costs continue to rise, and all while knowing that at the end of twenty years we would have no choice but to build a new school. In short, I cannot see our using the high school as a high school for 1200 or 1300 students in 2023. If you can, then I’m sure you will have doubts about this proposal. But I can’t. I cannot recommend to the taxpayers of this town to continue to pour tens of millions of dollars into that building when I am not convinced it can reasonably serve as a high school for another 20 or 25 years.

GHS was not built to serve us for 100 years. When it was built in 1957 the town was growing so quickly that we were out of space. We were teaching several grades in half-day double sessions due to a lack of space. It was built rapidly to meet an urgent need. It has served its purpose. The real problem is not that the cost is extreme or unsupportable based on short- and long-term educational benefits. Rather, it is that we are forced by state law to raise nearly all our local revenue from residential property taxes. For some individuals a tax rise will be a very real hardship. In no way do I minimize that. The property tax is unfair, antiquated, and regressive. It is unrelated to the ability to pay, it is unrelated to consumption, and as a tax on the gross value of one asset, it is unrelated even to what it is trying to tax, namely wealth. The property tax system must be reformed, but it must be reformed by the state. Guilford has done everything that it can legally do to take into account ability to pay by enacting the most progressive senior tax relief measure in the state. I am convinced that the savings from this program have far exceeded its costs to the rest of the town and that we have protected among the most vulnerable of our citizens. But the fact remains that residential property taxes must fund much of any construction. If this antiquated property tax forces us year after year to accept substandard schools, then we must ask why this system continues to be forced on us by the state. While I will continue to press for property tax reform, I cannot accept delay while that reform effort continues.

However, I will continue to ask that the cost figures be carefully examined to consider if additional savings can be made. I also intend to ask the Board of Finance to consider a longer bond term than 20 years in order to reduce annual payments, because there is no other expense of this magnitude that we will consider in the next 30 years.

As we as a town continue to debate this, I have one strong hope and expectation. To the supporters of a new school, I would suggest that those who disagree do not hate children or think that public education has no role in our society. Instead, they may just weigh the costs and benefits differently than you. To the opponents, I would suggest that no one wants to build a wasteful or opulent structure, and supporters are not fuzzy-headed dreamers whose only interest is to drive you out of town. Instead, they may just weigh the costs and benefits differently than you. This is the most important decision that we face as a town, and we need to reach a consensus. Reasonable people ought to be able to debate it reasonably, respectfully, honestly, and fairly with as Rev. Moe said 72 years ago, “calm, matured thought.” Quite separate from the result, how we approach the debate will be an important mark of our character as a town.

At the end of the day, the decision belongs to you, the voters.