Charlie Green is someone I follow and read regularly.
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Wednesday, March 28, 2012
“This is a great day for the town of Franklin”
“I couldn’t be more excited,” said Town Councilor and School Building Committee Chairman Thomas Mercer. “A major decision for the town was made by 10,000 people. It would have been a sin to see this decision made by 3,000 people.”
The debt exclusion will raise property taxes until 2040, costing the average homeowner $1 in fiscal 2013, $45 in fiscal 2014, $85 in fiscal 2015, $216 in fiscal 2016, and $260 every year after that until 2040.
The 104.5 million debt exclusion was the biggest obstacle for supporters of a new Franklin High School to overcome.
Now, town officials will finish creating contract documents, with Mercer saying he hopes to put the project out to bid by the end of July.
If everything stays on track, construction will break ground on the current high school sports fields this October, with students moving into a new school by the fall of 2014.
Read more: http://www.milforddailynews.com/news/x140148815/Voters-overwhelmingly-back-new-Franklin-High-School-project#ixzz1qOzMP2OI
The full set of results from the election can be found here
http://www.franklinmatters.org/2012/03/franklin-ma-debt-exclusion-precinct.html
Tuesday, March 27, 2012
Franklin, MA: Debt Exclusion - precinct totals
Precinct Yes No Blanks
1 1011 258
2 819 241
3 772 335
4 1093 251
5 777 274 1
6 1018 219
7 1366 210
8 1132 194
-----------------------------------------
Totals 7988 1982 1
9971 total votes cast of 20,500 eligible voters for a 48.6%
1 1011 258
2 819 241
3 772 335
4 1093 251
5 777 274 1
6 1018 219
7 1366 210
8 1132 194
-----------------------------------------
Totals 7988 1982 1
9971 total votes cast of 20,500 eligible voters for a 48.6%
Franklin, MA says "Yes" to model school program
The vote tally 9971
Yes = 7988
No = 1982
Total voters = 9971
Total registered voters = 20,500
percent voting 48.6%
Yes = 7988
No = 1982
Total voters = 9971
Total registered voters = 20,500
percent voting 48.6%
15 Letters to the Editor
If this is any indication on the level of civic engagement in Franklin, then this election has been good to get so many involved. Let's all get out to cast our ballot.
VOTE YES: Barlow - Don’t miss the chance on FHS
VOTE YES: Hartnett - Yes to a new Franklin High School
Voices of Franklin - Bill Glynn - Misinformation Campaign Manipulates Senior Citizens
The FHS vote is a rare situation when self-interest (to maintain lowest possible taxes) aligns with the community’s interest (to tend to the community’s needs). The high school problems are well documented: the entire facility must be made accessible to those with disabilities and the failing infrastructure must be upgraded to make the building safe and bring it up to code (these two issues alone will cost tens of millions of dollars in renovations). Franklin must decide either to pay $47M of the $104M cost to build a new school or 100% of the $86+M cost to renovate the existing school. The new school option is the taxpayers’ cheapest option and provides the best outcome. Since a “do nothing keep all my money” option doesn’t exist, a “NO” vote will cost Franklin $86+M instead of the $47M cost of a “YES” vote. It should be an easy decision.
Back when the current high school was built, there was no proposition 2.5, so the community probably looked at multiple options when deciding to build the current school – just like the building committee did during this analysis. There may have been a high-end option as well as a low-end option and perhaps middle of the road options too. The point is, the decision had to be analyzed and folks had to choose between competing goals such as: lowest-cost, best-value, maximum-benefit, etc. My guess is that their decision was more heavily-weighted toward the lowest-cost end of the spectrum. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have a school with all of the facilities embedded in concrete walls (a cheap way to build, but extremely expensive to renovate and upgrade) and we would have a handicapped-accessible school with elevators. These two items in particular answer the question posed by some, “how come Tri-County is OK?” The answer is directly linked to what was bought: Franklin didn’t buy a Mercedes or a Toyota Camry and so the end result was a school with a relatively short lifespan that was not designed to be upgradable.
In the current situation, the state (MSBA) decided between the options first and determined which option (if any) it would choose to fund. First, the MSBA funds school projects on the basis of need; the higher the need, the closer to the top of the list you get. So, unless you’re thinking that the state just has more money than it knows what to do with, you have to agree that FHS must have some level of need in order to be near the top of the list. The state chose the model school option because the costs are very deterministic (the model has been built several times so cost overruns are minimized) and the state wasn’t looking for the lowest-cost option (renovation was about 85% of the cost of a new model school). Rather, the state was looking more along the lines of value for the money being spent – in other words, a higher return on their investment because they don’t want us coming back in 15 years. That’s why we’re able to have the option to get a new model school for less money (shared cost) than a renovation (we pay the full cost because the state won’t throw good money after bad).
So, if there is clearly a need to fix issues at the high school and that need is so great that the cost is roughly 85% of the cost to build a completely new school as well as rip down and dispose of the old school and we can get the new school by paying only 40% of the cost, then what’s the problem? While I am sensitive to the issue that there are some folks facing financial difficulty, the biggest problem is there are many more people who don’t like to deal with inconvenient data; they’d rather invent their own data and invent their own options and they believe that a “NO” vote gets them their invented option. The reality is there is no option that says ignore the situation, do nothing, spend no money and continue on as though the $1M or so and multiple years the town spent on engineers to analyze the situation never happened. Go back to sleep, it’s just a bad dream. Toward that goal, there are those who have been intentionally deceiving the Franklin taxpayer and preying upon the vulnerabilities of Franklin’s cost-sensitive senior community in particular with a disinformation campaign claiming there are no problems – just say “NO” and all will be well. If they are successful, they will have spared the Franklin taxpayers a $47M bill by convincing them to opt for an $86+M bill.
Although masterful in its execution, this disinformation campaign is repugnant by design. Is it effective? Only if you fall victim to the “all’s well” fantasy or you fail to vote and help protect yourself and the community from those who are victimized.
Back when the current high school was built, there was no proposition 2.5, so the community probably looked at multiple options when deciding to build the current school – just like the building committee did during this analysis. There may have been a high-end option as well as a low-end option and perhaps middle of the road options too. The point is, the decision had to be analyzed and folks had to choose between competing goals such as: lowest-cost, best-value, maximum-benefit, etc. My guess is that their decision was more heavily-weighted toward the lowest-cost end of the spectrum. Otherwise, we wouldn’t have a school with all of the facilities embedded in concrete walls (a cheap way to build, but extremely expensive to renovate and upgrade) and we would have a handicapped-accessible school with elevators. These two items in particular answer the question posed by some, “how come Tri-County is OK?” The answer is directly linked to what was bought: Franklin didn’t buy a Mercedes or a Toyota Camry and so the end result was a school with a relatively short lifespan that was not designed to be upgradable.
In the current situation, the state (MSBA) decided between the options first and determined which option (if any) it would choose to fund. First, the MSBA funds school projects on the basis of need; the higher the need, the closer to the top of the list you get. So, unless you’re thinking that the state just has more money than it knows what to do with, you have to agree that FHS must have some level of need in order to be near the top of the list. The state chose the model school option because the costs are very deterministic (the model has been built several times so cost overruns are minimized) and the state wasn’t looking for the lowest-cost option (renovation was about 85% of the cost of a new model school). Rather, the state was looking more along the lines of value for the money being spent – in other words, a higher return on their investment because they don’t want us coming back in 15 years. That’s why we’re able to have the option to get a new model school for less money (shared cost) than a renovation (we pay the full cost because the state won’t throw good money after bad).
So, if there is clearly a need to fix issues at the high school and that need is so great that the cost is roughly 85% of the cost to build a completely new school as well as rip down and dispose of the old school and we can get the new school by paying only 40% of the cost, then what’s the problem? While I am sensitive to the issue that there are some folks facing financial difficulty, the biggest problem is there are many more people who don’t like to deal with inconvenient data; they’d rather invent their own data and invent their own options and they believe that a “NO” vote gets them their invented option. The reality is there is no option that says ignore the situation, do nothing, spend no money and continue on as though the $1M or so and multiple years the town spent on engineers to analyze the situation never happened. Go back to sleep, it’s just a bad dream. Toward that goal, there are those who have been intentionally deceiving the Franklin taxpayer and preying upon the vulnerabilities of Franklin’s cost-sensitive senior community in particular with a disinformation campaign claiming there are no problems – just say “NO” and all will be well. If they are successful, they will have spared the Franklin taxpayers a $47M bill by convincing them to opt for an $86+M bill.
Although masterful in its execution, this disinformation campaign is repugnant by design. Is it effective? Only if you fall victim to the “all’s well” fantasy or you fail to vote and help protect yourself and the community from those who are victimized.
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