In a 5-1 vote at its latest meeting with member Matthew Mihalcik opposing, the Board of Finance agreed to permit the School District to tap its nonlapsing fund to cover the cost of the engineering phase of the Hawley School HVAC project.

The Board of Education previously had voted unanimously to use funds in the account for the design or engineering phase, which was earmarked for bonding in the town’s five-year capital Improvement Plan or CIP.

The nonlapsing account provides an approved location into which the school board may transfer unexpended funds from the prior fiscal year from the budgeted appropriation for education, provided such amount does not exceed two percent of the total budgeted appropriation.

According to Town Finance Director Robert Tait, by statute, any such transfer into the nonlapsing account must be authorized by the finance board.

Timing Is An Issue

Once the motion to permit usage of the fund was made, Superintendent of Schools Dr Lorrie Rodrigue reminded officials that the project has been in the works for a protracted period of time, and the latest iteration of the project, including both heating, cooling, and fresh air circulation is optimal to ensure the health and safety of everyone using the facility.

As a result, Dr Rodrigue said the engineering phase is crucial — and applying funds from the nonlapsing account makes a lot of sense. School Board Chair Michelle Embree Ku concurred, saying the shift from bonding to using funds-on-hand mirrors a practice First Selectman Dan Rosenthal has been promoting, which involves applying more savings for specific capital projects and employing more of a “pay as you go” philosophy.

School Board capital projects committee member Dan Delia said his entire board is more focused on working collaboratively with other town boards and commissions, and using their own funds will help ensure the engineering of this new HVAC system is both precise and encompasses all the elements required to achieve the district’s project plan.

While finance board member Ned Simpson agreed that removing this phase from the bonding schedule was a good move, he stressed the priority focus should be on the unknown costs related to reopening and successfully administering the next school year after COVID-19 closures. To that end he suggested and motioned postponing any decision on spending from the nonlapsing fund until August, with Mihalcik seconding.

District Director of Business Ron Bienkowski asserted that moving on the process to get the engineering phase up and running should happen sooner than later so work could commence this summer. Finance board vice chair and former school board chairman Keith Alexander, who has substantial familiarity with the history of this developing project, said he would not be in favor of any further delays.

Fortifying The Fund

Speaking to Simpson’s concern, Bienkowski said the town and district would be dealing with a lot of challenges around potential reopening by August, reiterated that the nonlapsing account had the funds necessary to cover the phase one costs, and that the fund would be fortified with new money — presumably from an anticipated and robust district budget surplus — by the end of the 2019-20 fiscal cycle June 30.

A vote to delay the project failed 5-1 with Mihalcik supporting the delay.

Moving back to the main business at hand, finance board member Chris Gardner asked for a brief history of the Hawley HVAC project. Bienkowski responded saying it has been in some form of development for 15 years, and different aspects of the project have already been completed. Rosenthal, who was attending the virtual meeting, said the project cost has fluctuated over the years, and in 2005, was estimated at $5.6 million.

The first selectman said that the project is still estimated to cost about the same in the end when factoring the price of improvements already done added to the current CIP requests totaling $4,262,000.

Dr Rodrigue said she would not have supported moving the HVAC project forward using the district nonlapsing fund balance if she believed the district would need it all for reopening and reentry expenses, and the school board shared her confidence.

Bienkowski assured the finance board that $300,000 would be adequate to bring the project to the construction phase — and that engineers would be asked to complete their work factoring that budget cap. He added that the town Building & Site Commission and Sustainable Energy Commission were already on board as consultants to the project.

Dr Rodrigue added that the district facilities director was also familiar with, and was poised to work closely on this as the project develops.

With all questions answered, finance board Chair Sandy Roussas called for a vote on the motion to permit the district to tap its nonlapsing account for the $300,000, and the motion was successful.