Ticonderoga schools seek $23 million building project

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August 27, 2007

By LOHR McKINSTRY The Press Republican Mon Aug 27, 2007, 12:00 AM EDT

TICONDEROGA -- A $23.87 million building project that would add a new High School wing is set to go before Ticonderoga Central School District voters in September.

The vote is from noon to 8 p.m. Tuesday, Sept. 25, at Ticonderoga High School and the Hague Community Center.

A District Facilities Committee has been working on the project for a year, Superintendent John McDonald Jr. said.

"The community was well-represented on the committee. They left no stone unturned. We identified a lot of work in terms of security and safety."

The architects, Collins and Scoville, PC, of Albany, came up with eight options for the district to chose from.

THE PROJECT

Selected were a new High School wing to house the Technology Department, with bays at the rear for the Marine and Recreational Technology Program and first-floor classrooms and gallery space for the Art Department and second-floor Music Department classrooms.

The offices for the High School, Elementary School and Middle School will be relocated to the entrance areas for security reasons, and district offices will move into the High School.

High School windows will be replaced, and the gymnasium will get a new floor and bleachers.

A new cafeteria and kitchen will be added at the Elementary-Middle School, along with new classrooms there.

The project will enclose the open-space libraries in both the middle and elementary schools so they can be used as safe areas in case of emergencies. It will also redesign the student drop-off area to make it easier for parents to use.

COST

McDonald said the $23.87 million cost of the project will be offset by 68-percent state building aid and $700,000 in State Excel Program aid.

The district plans to partner with International Paper, which has a mill in Ticonderoga, to qualify for a U.S. Department of Education Qualified Zone Academy Bond for an interest-free loan of $2.7 million. As part of the required business contribution, IP will match 10 percent of the loan.

The local share of the project amounts to about $1.01 million a year. A taxpayer with a house assessed at $100,000 and a basic STAR exemption would pay an extra $72 a year in school taxes.

P-R FIRM HIRED

For this vote, the district is using the services of WriteEdge Communications of Gansevoort to help publicize the project to residents.

That's resulted in a slogan for the project, "What are we building? It's more than just bricks and mortar," which the district will use in flyers and ads.

McDonald said he felt that a previous building project in 2003 was sabotaged by an erroneous anonymous flyer that was inserted into copies of a weekly paper just before the vote. That project, for $20.7 million, included a swimming pool and new gymnasium -- items that are not in the current project.

The previous project may have been defeated by the inaccurate flyer, McDonald said, so the Facilities Committee asked the architects if they could recommend a public-relations firm to counter any negative campaign. The $9,500 cost to hire the consultants will be included in the architectural fees, he said.

"There was a lot of misinformation that came out in the last project. We did not do a good job of educating (residents). The committee felt we needed to do a good job (this time) and deal with the misinformation."

CHARACTER

The project's slogan is meant to convey the fact that they're also building the character of their students with a good education, McDonald said.

Using the academy model will mean incorporating top-level ethics, work habits and skills into the curriculum, he said.

"We're trying to address the needs of our kids, to provide them with opportunities. We believe art, music and technology are part of a well-rounded education."

lmckinstry@pressrepublican.com