At risk of stealing the momentum from Bob Burke’s 225-plus comment thread about the Zervas School project, I’m going to start a new one.
Today, Maureen Lemieux, Mayor Warren’ s Chief of Staff/Chief Financial Officer distributed this document to the Board of Aldermen in response to questions regarding the acquisition of the three residential properties that abut the Zervas Elementary School site.
Read it and, need I tell you that you should feel welcome to discuss it?
Hi Ted, not evasive at all, it’s just not clear how one should answer it. Let’s use my house as an example – when we renovated we made it right-sized for 6 and proportioned the bedrooms and common spaces accordingly. Six is our “design capacity”. But if push came to shove, a family of 10 or more could live here. So what’s our “maximum capacity”?
As a practical matter NPS has capped school enrollment at 500 students and worked to move kids who were tracking to Countryside and Bowen (another 24-classroom school) to other schools when their enrollment hit that cap. Could we place more than 490 students in the new Zervas? Well of course. But our class sizes relate to how we support and teach our children; for example Angier once had over 700 students when lecture-style teaching was the norm and students sat in neat, tight rows facing forward. A 2014 Newton elementary school classroom has kids broken out into small study groups engaging with teachers, coaches, and aides. Some students may work 1:1 in a corner with an adult specialist. The activities in our classrooms help determine class size which dictates school size when multiplied by room count. What is the “maximum capacity” of Horace Mann, which currently enrolls 420 students or so? Change the teaching and learning structure and raise the class size and it can go way up…..but we have invested big dollars in maintaining class size and we’ve built our teaching and learning models upon it.
The text response to question 32 in your Q&A packet addresses your suggestion that the Zervas site is too small for a 490 student school:
“More recently, MSBA has recognized that, with good site design, it is possible to design good schools on smaller sites, and they have eliminated the minimum acreage requirement from their regulations. Their requirements now state:
“ The site selected shall be chosen on the basis that it will meet the educational need, maximize the use of any available community resources, and minimize any possible adverse educational, environmental, social, or economic impact upon the community. “
The current plan for the Zervas School meets all requirements of the program within the 4.2 acres available with the acquisition of neighboring properties. This is possible because the site is flat and has proportions that lend themselves to very efficient building footprint and site design. The fact that the building has a three – story classroom wing is part of what makes this possible. Sites with different characteristics might well require more acreage to support the same building and site program.”
Also please note that 8 of our 15 elementary schools sit on sites smaller than the 4.2 acre Zervas site. And at Zervas, especially with the acquisition of the three Beacon Street properties, we can position the building optimally onsite to maximize program fit.
You well know that more formal traffic and parking studies will follow once we know whether the site will be expanded by the three Beacon Street properties. In the meantime every design professional involved (including our hired architects, OPM, the DRC, DRT, ZSBC) along with our traffic and safety people including Newton Police endorse the property acquisitions as contributing to a superior, safer project. I am not one to blindly say “trust the professionals” about our current plan, but the consistency of their support and their articulate, rational descriptions of how they arrived at this support provides me with considerable reassurance.
Marti got my comment and actually, so did all the guys. “It is demeaning to elementary school teachers to be treated worse than high school teachers. It implies no one really gives a rats behind about the important job they do or cares about their safety. I’m sure all of you knew that.” That’s the truth.
Of course I was referring to Charlie Baker’s sexist attitude, but I was also referring to the attitude of a community that talks the talk, but refuses to walk the walk. Elementary teaching is a female dominated profession, and as such, is held in lower regard than other professions. More troubling, those teaching at this level receive less respect than even their high school colleagues. Trust me, it goes way beyond parking spaces. All anyone is asking for is equality of working conditions at all levels of the school system, and that doesn’t exist in Newton.
The fact is in 2014, young women are insisting on a new kind of respect in the work place and I think it’s great. My generation got us just so far, but people in all female dominated professions are standing up to the double standard in working conditions so you might as well get used to it.
If what it takes to provide equal working conditions for elementary teachers is buying 3 houses, then do it or put the building elsewhere in the city where the working conditions are equal to those found in the high schools.
Jane — Could it be that part of the value in a HS parking is that it’s where major regional sports activities take place, where people fake graduation speeches, and where some impressive arts presentations take place? Most unaffiliated residents going to an elementary school are going to vote and we know that’s not a big crowd
Hoss – I wish that were the case, but with the renovation and rebuilding of the high schools, the number of parking spaces was determined by the number of staff. As it should be at all levels of the school system. Equal working conditions for all, Hoss. It’s not asking too much.
Thumbs up for parking spaces for elementary school teachers and staff.
However, wouldn’t it be nice if a school was near the Eliot MBTA station or the Newton Highlands station or the Riverside station? My husband teaches in Brookline and takes the MBTA from Newton to Brookline, and even gets a percentage of his monthly T pass reimbursed. Reduced carbon emissions, and an incentive to use public transportation. We make a few car trips annually to bring in heavy materials, but otherwise a large backpack or shoulder bag works just fine.
Angier is a short distance from the Waban MBTA station.
Maybe Steve could explain that although:
“… 8 of our 15 elementary schools sit on sites smaller than the 4.2 acre Zervas site.”
all of these other schools have good sized playing fields and parks abutting the sites.
Zervas is unique in its lack of abutting fields.
It will remain so in the current plan.
A real opportunity to bring Zervas into a more equitable state re play/field space is being lost in this current rush.
Also note that Newton has had an average elementary school size of about 350 for 40 years.
Now we are abandoning that small size school approach which has served us so well and helped develop Newton’s educational reputation, for this new larger school approach.
In this rush to spend the override money on one project, we are abandoning some very cherished values.
Educational and other key values should drive the building program not the reverse.
Thanks for your comments Geoff. Each of our school sites is unique. Zervas not only has fields onsite, but is adjacent to the walking paths of Cold Spring Park and it’s availability for use as a biology classroom and hiking area. Zervas is also a three-minute walk from Richardson field which offers another 3 acres of outdoor recreation space.
Regarding school size, our elementary enrollment is growing. We can address this by either adding school buildings or by enlarging existing buildings. You don’t agree but we have concluded that with current projections and considering trade-offs, enlarging existing schools is preferred. The academic performance of our larger schools are generally high and are comparable to schools of all sizes across the district; in addition nearby towns with elementary sizes above ours, including Lexington, Concord, and Brookline, also have superior academic performance. Until we see even a glimmer of evidence that our academic performance will suffer with schools in the 450-500 student enrollment range, I am not afraid of schools of this size.
I hope this helps to address some of your concerns.
Steve,
Thanks for your comments too.
… BUT.
For 40 years Newton valued small schools. It was an educational value.
Now in a space crunch, we are giving that value up.
The SC has never had a substantive discussion of the role small schools play in our educational success and is giving up without a fight.
Large capital projects are Newton’s weakest point. They should not force the erosion of our educational values.
On the specifics, ask the Zervas kids how much use Richardson field is during the school day to them? The fact is that they cannot use it at lunchtime or at any other break. A round trip would take about 20 minutes for a class by the time you actually do it. Richardson field is of no use for play space.
Zervas has a very small play area now and it would have to be increased by 50% just to stay at its current space per student, with the mega commuter school option. And it looks to me like the play space per child will actually decrease with the current mega commuter school plan.
Our sole experience with larger elementary schools is with Countryside and Bowen. Ask the parents how that went and you’ll get the answer that they were constantly under pressure, fighting for resources and had the largest class sizes in the district. That’s more than a glimmer of evidence!
Larger elementary schools mean larger class sizes both from our experience and the math.
At 80 kids per grade (480 school size), both Bowen and Countryside experience that being split into 3 classes of 27 rather than 4 classes of 20. With these mega commuter schools you can let class size float to 27 quite easily and that happened at both Bowen and Countryside.
At 65 kids per grade (400 school size), you are never going to get large class sizes. There will always be 3 classes per grade. You cannot go to 2 as class size would shoot to 32.
[In addition, both of these larger elementary schools had plenty of adjacent field space.]
They are not a model to follow – from our own experience.
Forget the other districts you quote and note that Brookline does not have elementary schools. They are a K-8 system.
Finally, everyone I have met in Newton agrees that we closed too many elementary schools, so they would be much happier if we still had 16 or 17 schools.
If we did, we’d be managing our population increase much more effectively.
If we think we closed too many elementary schools, why is there such huge resistance to opening a new one and reversing that terrible past mistake.
The evidence remains very strong in Newton that elementary schools of 400-425 would serve our kids best educationally and would cost less per seat added, reduce traffic and congestion, increase walking to schools and provide the greatest flexibility to handle any future population trend.
We are at an educational cross road here.
Which road will we take?
Hi Geoff,
Here is a link to the January 2014 elementary class size report. Where are you getting your numbers? This report shows exactly the opposite of what you are suggesting.
Specifically, our three largest schools, Bowen, Countryside, and Mason-Rice, have zero classes with more than 24 students. Systemwide there are 6 classes of 25 or more students in schools over 400, and 11 classes of 25 or more students in schools under 400. 9 of these classes are in some of our very smallest schools, with 4 at Lincoln Eliot, 3 at Underwood, and 2 at Ward.
Similarly Newton’s testing results reveal strong academic achievement at both smaller and larger schools, and weaker academic achievement at other of our smaller and larger schools. So regarding your statement that “The evidence remains very strong in Newton that elementary schools of 400-425 would serve our kids best educationally”, please show this evidence! A researcher could not draw this conclusion from Newton’s testing data.
I am happy to continue this exchange, but for starters let’s agree on the same set of facts.
–Steve
The kids are here. The will to fund the 2 or 3 extra elementary buildings that would be necessary to address the citywide problem of overcrowding is not. The opportunity to buy properties adjacent to an elementary school doesn’t come along every day. Buy them, for goodness sakes.
I return to the issue of equity. Why was it so necessary to fund high school student and staff parking but when it comes to the elementary school staff, providing parking is considered a waste of money?
Steve,
It’s the history of these schools.
2104 might be just fine, but the record over the past 8 or so years shows otherwise. You also were not on the SC when we visited Countryside and Emily Ostrower, the principal at the time, argued for 425 as the optimal school size based on years of having to deal with Countryside as it ballooned past 500.
Just look at the class size data over the past 6 years. The consistently largest class sizes have been at schools which have gone past 425.
The largest class sizes have occurred at Countryside, Bowen, Memorial-Spaulding, Mason Rice.
Ward, Williams, Underwood, Lincoln-Eliot, Peirce have rarely had large class sizes.
[I am sure the Ward community will not be so happy when the city comes to super size their school. They should join the fight to right size Zervas.]
On average, smaller schools guarantee small class sizes. The 2014 class sizes are unusually low, built on a generous override.
The norm over prior years has been quite different.
There will be no successful operating override in the next 5 years with the current position of Newton leadership on capital plan management. Confidence in government is eroding.
Zervas could have provided an opportunity to boost confidence in government. The opposite has happened.
I consider it well worth fighting on, but the battle is really not with you. It’s with the leadership whose message you are conveying.
During the time I was on the SC, much effort was put into trying to contain school size increase given the Countryside problems. The MSBA was argued down from over 500 for Angier to 460 or so.
All that has now changed for reasons of expediency.
We maybe headed for the Chappaqua school district model, but we should consider how different Newton is before we do that.
Geoff,
I’ve gone back over the enrollment data to 2007 and large classes were found in larger and smaller schools alike. You’ve made a lot of strong statements such as “On average, smaller schools guarantee small class sizes.” The data simply does not support this, then or now.
We are not seeing the same highest class sizes that we saw then, anywhere in the system – expanded buffer zones have been an invaluable enrollment management tool, and we’ve also placed many more modulars at schools with the greatest space needs.
Countryside’s problems have been about not having sufficient space for the student count. That’s a far cry different that making a research-based claim that a 500-student school is inherently problematic. In a recent post I noted two examples of communities with high academic achievement and school sizes approaching and exceeding 500 students, Concord and Lexington. There are many more around us.
Steve, my question was straightforward, and simple. If enrollment exceeds projections and class sizes in Zervas go up, what is the maximum number of students the building will accommodate? It matters, because the more students coming to this school, the more traffic and parking issues there will be. Not answering a simple question looks contemptuous.
As for the lack of a traffic and parking study, when developers look at the potential for a site they have not yet acquired, they frequently will study traffic and parking to see if they can make it work for the size and scope of the proposed project. I am well aware the city will do studies in order to get site plan approval. A number of years ago, the BOA was also told by the people in charge not to worry, that there should be no asbestos where the foundation for the new NNHS was to be dug. I trusted them. That did not work out so well, either.
Lack of openness and transparency is a continuing issue. A year or so ago when I first heard it was a consideration and tried to raise the takings issue on the blogs, I was told–by you–to keep it on the down low. How I wish we had started this conversation much sooner.
Steve Siegel is being very professional in providing data, and going above and beyond to describe how Newton arrived at the current plan to expand Zervas. The “Perfect Storm” scenario of what if every house bred twice the number of kids and Newton schools were overflowing, what is the exact number than this Zervas building could take, the highest wave in the biggest storm — and please say it on the internet so I can scare neighbors at size of the wave and impending disasters? That’s a real question?
@Hoss, it is not unreasonable to ask when the express plan is to expand Zervas to accommodate increased enrollments that exceeded past projections. If you build it, they will come. We have a recurring problem with, for example, restaurants that exceed the number of seats they are permitted, which come to the board of aldermen for a special permit seeking forgiveness rather than permission when they get caught. Do the neighbors think it has an adverse impact on traffic and parking in their neighborhoods? You bet they do.
THM — How about sending an email to the SC head asking if there is any document describing overflow capacity at the proposed Zervas building (not yet designed…) such that I can evaluate whether it differs much from existing schools? In other words, would this building ultimately absorb Citywide overflow if redistricting occurs because of the design?
Just seems your badgering this one unlucky committee member over something he he doesn’t own.
What Hoss said. The enrollment in the entire system may very well skyrocket, as it has in Brookline. But in the unlikely scenario that it happens in just one school, the city has incorporated buffer zones and may have to do some redistricting in various parts of the city.
Everyone knew about the asbestos under the NN site, and knew exactly where it was. There are even first hand accounts of people watching the city bury it when the first NHS was taken down. There were several estimates of $12-14m for its removal in the December of 2006 – a full 8 months before construction began.
Ted, adding the pertinent part of our discussion of this past winter would be remarkably helpful. To your assertion that “full transparency would dictate that we share with the public that there is a consideration to buy the Beacon Street properties” I told you that we didn’t know if we were going to recommend acquiring them. I told you we wouldn’t know this until the architect’s study was further along. I told you I thought it would be remarkably insensitive to the property owners to signal this before the City had determined their interest in the property and approached the owners (Imagine learning from the TAB that the City had its sights on your house….). I told you I thought this would be irresponsible and would possibly subject the City to a lawsuit as well, since purchase rumors that were just that might inhibit a different potential buyer from making an offer on any of their properties. That was the fuller substance of our conversation. Do you honestly believe we should have publicly spoken about this before we were persuaded of the property’s value to the project, and approached the owners? I emphatically don’t.
Ted, I agree with you that your question about maximum capacity was both straightforward and simple. And we all understand that more capacity means more students, parents, and staff coming to the building. But your dismissiveness regarding the substance of the thoughtful answer reflects upon you and not upon those who are answering.
Ted, in our numerous conversations, emails, and blog exchanges, I’ve shared with you the reasoning behind the overwhelming support that the site acquisitions have from every consultant and City agency involved on the Zervas project. There are excellent design reasons for these acquisitions that have nothing to do with traffic and parking. You’ve never responded to them and keep the conversation only about your unhappiness that we don’t yet have a more detailed traffic and parking study. Why is this?
Steve Siegel — I think if it’s three homes or three towns (e.g., Quabbin site), eminent domain is a subject that should be discussed openly. It gives interested parties a chance to speak before the bulldozer driver is paid. How many executive sessions and on how many different topics has this current school committee undertaken? There’s no reason the Minutes to each one of these sessions should not be kept on-line so the public can ask questions about the number and scope of sessions. They are not.
Hoss – The “Perfect Storm scenario” you criticize asking about is invoked every time to push for maximizing parking. Literally.
Steve,
Sure you can find a large class here and there in smaller schools, but the overall picture is that larger schools tend to have more large classes in average budget cycles where override money is not providing class size relief.
Look at the FY09 class size data, focus on classes of 26 or more and call them large. Here’s what you’ll find:
There were 28 large classes, of which 20 were at Bowen(443), Memorial-Spaulding(435), Cabot(422) and Mason-Rice(419), with 8 at Burr(362), Lincoln-Eliot(301) and Williams(278).
The school sizes are in parentheses after each school.
That is the trend I am talking about. Most of the larger classes will occur at the larger schools due to the math of the situation where you can split a grade of 80 into 3 classes of 26,26,27 but you cannot split a grade of 60 into 2 classes of 30.
Ward, the smallest school in the district has never had large classes, to the best of my knowledge!
Here is the full data set:
Angier (school size: 396) – 0 large classes
Bowen (443) – 6
Burr (362) – 4
Cabot (422) – 3
Countryside (453) – 0
Franklin (426) – 0
Horace Mann (373) – 0
Lincoln-Eliot (301) – 2
Mason-Rice (419) – 5
Memorial-Spaulding (435) – 6
Peirce (328) – 0
Underwood (281) – 0
Ward (256) – 0
Williams (278) – 2
Zervas (324) – 0
Hi Geoff, the trend is that with our expanded buffer zones and additional modular installations, we have been able to reduce the number of classes with high student counts. We can both pick and choose a given year to make a specific point, but the magic math you suggest is simply not there, especially since the class size variance from one cohort to the following year’s can be so different.
Referring to the Ward School, which you believe has never had large classes, here are the largest class sizes there for each year since 2005, according to the NPS enrollment books that reside online: 25, 24, 24, 23, 26, 25, 27, 25, 26. The school department considers large classes to be 25 students and above – by this standard Ward had large classes in 6 of the previous nine years.
Sure, but what if your grade of 80 in the large school creeps up to 90 – you still can’t have classes of 30, right? You need 4 classes of 22 and 23 – and someplace to put them. And if your “small” school has a grade with 54 kids, you can split it into 2 large classes of 27 – that’s what happened at Burr before we got the modulars. It doesn’t really matter if the school is “large” or “small” – how ever many classrooms you have at a grade level, there comes a tipping point as enrollment grows. And it is growing.
Steve,
Point taken on Ward data.
Nonetheless, you’ll find that Ward has pretty much the lowest incidence of large classes for all of our schools in that period.
The math is not magic. It’s simply true that for smaller schools, on average, you cannot split 60 per grade into 2 classes of 30, nor 70 per grade into 2 classes of 35. You’ll always find that on average(!) those lower numbers per grade favor smaller classes.
Once you hit 80 per grade, you can divide that into 3 classes of about 27 and that is what happens.
Sometimes the smaller schools have a bulge in a grade due to population age fluctuations and that accounts for the occasional larger class sizes in smaller schools.
But once you go to 80 per grade for each grade, you build in the ability to have large classes with higher frequency.
It’s also the case that schools designed for a certain number of students are operated well past that design size. Countryside was designed for 350 but operated at 500 or more.
With likely population and budget pressures, it is almost certain in my view that Zervas will operate well past its design size and could reach 550 or more. Imagine the congestion then!
With most of our elementary schools operating at near maximum capacity, buffer zones simply shift the problem. So one should not look to buffer zones for anything other than limited, short term mitigation.
My real take on Zervas is that the mega plan proponents keep on emphasizing the virtues of its central location for a very good reason. They intend to bus more and more students to it as the population increases. The central location facilitates busing!!!
So their intention is for sure to operate it well past the 490 size as student population increases and budgets have no money to add teachers for the expanded population.
Class size will rise and it will rise with the least constraint in these larger schools, especially Zervas.
We are in effect engaged in school consolidation where we favor 15 schools enlarging rather than adding more schools.
The result will be higher administrative costs and busing costs as has proven in other cases where small schools have been transitioned to large schools.
Maybe we’ll end up like Chappaqua where it looks like all of the students take buses to school.
See:
http://www.ccsd.ws/policies.cfm?pid=18760&searchwords=
Tricia,
My point remains that despite these single data points, our trend has been to have more larger classes at the larger schools. That’s what the data shows.
As you say if we keep on going to a 540 design size, then you cannot split the 90 up into large class sizes.
So in some sense, we have chosen the worst design size at around 80 per grade. That appears to optimize the possibility for large class sizes to occur.
It also make the incremental administrative costs very high, where we add an assistant principal at 450, which is an entire added $100K to handle maybe 50 more students!
If you kept on enlarging the elementary school size you would get more bang for your administrative buck.
Then again I recall a remarkable case in another school district where they were splitting a 700 student elementary school into two schools of 350 as they found the large school had so many management problems.
But the bludgeoning financial considerations will likely dominate the educational considerations as we move away from our successful neighborhood school model.
The issue is that our “large” elementary schools weren’t designed to be large – they are over capacity due to rapid population growth in certain areas of the city. (Some might call it “unforeseen” rapid growth, others would call it “shoulda seen it coming” rapid growth.) So it’s not surprising to see higher class sizes in these schools when they simply run out of physical space to add another section; the kids have to go somewhere, so class size goes up.
I prefer smaller elementary schools. In my perfect world, Newton would have enough elementary schools that no kid was more than 1.5 miles away from their neighborhood school or in a class with more than 20 kids. (In this perfect world, Newton would also provide reasonable school bus service for all kids – including middle and high school kids – who live more than a mile from their schools. And a whole bunch of other things that I’m not holding my breath waiting for.) But this world isn’t perfect, and apparently I am not going to get everything I want, and a larger building designed with adequate space and facilities for a higher enrollment is way better than an overcapacity small school.
What Tricia said!
Not to get too high altitude, but for me, as someone who really values the things that have historically made Newton a great place to live, the big picture question is: What we do we truly value as a community? What are we willing to pay more for (or not) to maintain? What long range vision is our elected and city leadership (and by this I don’t just mean the School Committee and their hired architects) articulating as a vision for our schools that will inspire taxpayers? How much focus do we, as a community (with values that place strong emphasis on both educational excellence and connected neighborhoods) place on maintaining genuine neighborhood elementary schools as a catalyst for the things that have always made living in Newton so special?
The Zervas plan is a short-term reaction to a population surge, not in any way part of a clearly articulated long-term vision for what a Newton education and buying a home/ raising a family in Newton means.. When it comes to long-term vision and leadership, it really feels to me that, just as we are pre-supposing a negative response from whatever bureaucratic government entity approves or denies expansion into wetlands at Zervas, we are similarly underestimating the commitment of the average Newton voter to supporting education and fostering connected communities. All without ever giving them a vote to officially vote up or down on easily quantifiable educational funding issues that are at the core of our supposed community values.
Moving forward, will we have individual, reactionary and completely disconnected debt-exclusion overrides on specific buildings? Or, will we be funding projects that are stages in a comprehensive plan that brings our defined community vision to life?
Brookline passed an override that funded world languages in their elementary schools by putting forward an override question on the subject that challenged the values and vision of its voters.
Wellesley passed an override that funded full day kindergarten by challenging its voters to support early investment in education.
Why do the powers-that-be assume that Newton voters don’t care as much as our neighbors in Brookline and Wellesley? Why are the only things that we’re being asked to vote for about building projects? Why aren’t we instead, like voters in neighboring communities, having the opportunity to vote about the educational program, long range vision and character of the school system upon which everyone’s property values are based?
Newton passed three overrides to support education – more than Brookline and Wellesley. Our buildings are in much worse condition than the schools in either of those communities. B’line school facilities were renovated or rebuilt well before Newton considered even addressing basic maintenance issues. So guess what? They were able to move on to improving programs, leaving Newton to deal with its dilapidated, outdated elementary schools in 2014.
Now the elementary school facilities have finally risen to the top of the list. It’s about time. Does the city have the will to fund more elementary schools? I really doubt it. I’d love to see it happen, but after watching how much effort it took for a small group of volunteers to get 55% of the voters to approve the replacement of 2 positively disgusting elementary schools, I just can’t imagine the voters approving another override any time soon.
“expanded buffer zones have been an invaluable enrollment management tool,”
Expanded buffer zones have been a community erosion tool, where the children upstairs and the same aged kids downstairs in a 2 family are sent to different schools; where a parent gets stuck in the traffic caused by expanded buffering, and cannot call the neighbor and ask them to hold on to the kids til she/he get’s there, because the neighbor’s kids are three congested miles away in the opposite direction at dismissal. The parents belong to two separate PTOs. After a couple of years, the parents no longer see each other; the kids see the neighbor parents as strangers. And they live five houses apart.
Moving to the big school model that uses expanded buffer zones to manage school allocations, and at the same time espousing a commitment to the 13 villages of Newton is just not possible. This policy of busing is changing the nature of the city, and those who propose it need to own up to that fact.
Hi Marie, I didn’t mean to imply that buffer zones are all good and you have articulated their downside better than I ever could. They are, as I’ve described, a simple but effective tool to manage enrollment when a given school runs out of room. And yes, they take a toll on some who live within.
Creating more capacity, whether it be by adding a new school in your neighborhood or enlarging schools in other neighborhoods, shrinks buffer zones. As I’ve noted to you and your Upper Falls neighbors, our hope is to shrink and eliminate buffer zones wherever possible.
“The big school model” as you call it has nothing to do with buffer zones; we have always had a variant of them at the district boundaries between two schools regardless of school size. They were called “choice zones” and parents could choose between the adjacent schools. As many of our schools hit capacity these became “buffer zones” and now NPS makes the final decision on school assignments. Parents can still express a preference and in recent years 80% of these preferences have been honored.
Karen, yes, read the CIP. It uses an analytic methodology to rank capital projects over time and is a determinant of our long range planning. It is not perfect but is a huge improvement over our “squeaky wheel” approach used in the past to prioritize our capital improvements.
Jane, I can’t imagine another override passing anytime soon either. But the reason is that the School Committee has violated the trust of the voters and marches on with a wasteful, wrong-headed, unnecessary Zervas project, squandering $40 million in the process that should be used to maximum effect: Building a 16th elementary school.
Zervas does not need to be rebuilt. It needs a $6-10 million renovation and small expansion. Why are we spending $40 million to add 170 seats? For that money we can have 400 seats in Upper Falls, which is the center of the school void and where much residential development will occur over the next decade. You don’t even have to pass the MCAS to figure out that any new school capacity should go there.
What astonishes me is that it seems like the School Committee doesn’t really care about getting another override passed. If they did, they would be worried about leaving three whole villages worth of griping buffer zoners with zilch. Not to mention flushing $40 million into a swamp and champing at the bit to spend $2.7 million to make a meaningless expansion of the Zervas property so they can go all Joni Mitchell on us.
There is no sense to this plan. If the SC had any guts they would back away from it.
And what Karen said! As always.
Of course the SC and the Mayor cannot see beyond tomorrow – that is why they did not buy the Aquinas property which would help alleviate some of this overcrowding.
The other issue that is the elephant in the room with the overcrowding issue is the Metco Program and beyond that the fact that MANY children that do not physically live in the city are going to our schools – do you think that might be worth some money to go and investigate? I have had heard from numerous parents and even teachers at different schools in the city about kids that are in the schools but live elsewhere and are using a Newton address to get away with it.
The 16th school is off the table, so I don’t know why that’s part of the discussion. You can talk about it all you want but it just isn’t happening.
As for buffer zones, they’re a great improvement over the redistricting of the past, and one that would have benefitted my family. One son was redistricted from a middle school that was one mile from our home to one that was 1.95 miles from home – that would be 100 yards from the line that defined eligibility for bus transportation. We drove him to school for 3 years but Adam, you’ll be pleased to know that he walked home just about every day.
Despite the focus on Zervas, there isn’t just one story about overcrowded, dilapidated elementary schools. Keep in mind that these problems exist in every elementary school in all sections of the city. The School Committee is trying to deal with a growing issue that threatens the quality of the entire school system, not just one corner of the city. They are not the enemy.
Steve writes:
For a while, at least a decade or more, but not always. These are tools used to manage the results of poor choices made in the 1970’s and 80’s.
Great posts by both Steve Feinstein and Marie Jackson. Steve is absolutely correct. It’s imperative that the City get this right or it will almost certainly doom the chances for the success of any further overrides if they do not. I’ve just learned that the Finance Committee is taking up the acquisition of the 3 properties tomorrow evening and that what they vote to approve will be put to the Aldermen next Monday evening. There are no enemies or bad guys in this debate; just people who see things differently.
And, thank you Marie for putting a very passionate and human face on the downside of expanded “buffer zones”. You obviously know what you are talking about since you are an integral part of the Upper Falls community that has suffered disproportionately from the adverse side effects of this practice in recent years.
We have 13 villages, but each is different, with different needs and outlooks. Upper Falls is a case in point. Jane may be correct in stating that a 16th school is “off the table” and her comments about some positive aspects of buffering also have obvious merit because she has personally experienced them; but Marie’s comments may be a major reason why a 16th School for Upper Falls should have been considered more seriously than it has been. Maybe it’s still not too late. In terms of Upper Falls specifically, this is much more than just the ability for students to walk to school. It’s also a question of community cohesion and interaction and yes, a spiritual sense of place that can help banish loneliness and isolation particularly for the elderly and younger adults who move to Upper Falls with their children ready for elementary school. A 16th school could provide much of this interaction to all age groups in this Village because it would have rooms and other spaces available for after school use. This is crucial because Upper Falls has lost so many local institutions in the last 30 years that used to provide this interaction, mainly a branch public library and a neighborhood school; It’s also about to lose it’s access to the Emerson Center that has been serving as a kind of make shift community center for the past 30 years because this space is about to revert back to the condo owners under terms of the original least. Upper Falls has also seen other institutions seriously weakened in terms of interaction at the village level including fraternal groups and strong church institutions like Mary Immaculate of Lourdes parish which owes its continued existence more to the Sunday Latin Mass than to the ever changing makeup of the Upper Falls Community. And I’ve just learned that the Saint Elizabeth’s Center at Mary Immaculate is now being advertised for sale by the Parish. Upper Falls desperately needs a central gathering place and a 16th School could provide that in good style.
Finally, I never participated in the discussion to put a 16th School at the DPW yard on Elliott Street because I thought it lacked the location or character to serve as a central focal point for the Upper Falls Community. I had been hopeful that the City would take another look at the Braceland Field area since that’s more at the heart of the village than almost any other place that would be available. I’m sorry the benefits of a 16th school in Upper Falls was not examined with these attributes in mind. Again, maybe it’s still not too late.
In my mind both Zervas and Angier are at projected capacity. I know several families with multiple younger children who are looking for housing in those districts under the assumption that the schools will be completed once their oldest kids are kindergarten ready. I assume there are other many other like minded families so I hope that planners are operating under over-capacity scenarios within the building and not just in the parking lot. I hate to think it but I already want to know where on both schools the inevitable modulars are going to get placed; and I want to know that some of that $ is getting set aside to pay for it so the future SC committee isn’t coming back hat in hand pointing fingers at the 2014 process.
Jane or anyone – fairly new in town here – can citizens put a plan for a language programme or say a 16th school on a ballot? Honestly, Zervas isn’t my district but I worked on the override. If it’s a 16th school we really need then lets just get it done. Naive – probably – but seriously, if it’s legally possible, why can’t we put educational measures to the voters? There are no enemies in this process only people who fail to agree on the best way forward. And since I’m new – it’s not really clear to me the questions we’re debating have actually been asked. Even if results are non-binding at least the vote is up or down and we can throw the results on the next Mayor’s desk.
Thanks
Hello Joyce,
I’d be happy to meet you for coffee and discuss the many topics you’ve raised. Please feel free to contact me at [email protected]
Regards, Steve
What Bob said!
Jane, we’re paying for the table, the plans that are on the table, and the people that sit around that table. And, good Lord, we will pay not only for the implementation of those plans, but the cost of not implementing other plans.
If something we know we want is not on OUR table, then we should show up to the meeting room and put it there.
Instead we are sheep, wandering around our villages, mumbling that you can’t fight city hall. In this case, it’s the SC that has no will to fight NPS. Maybe it’s that the School Committee are essentially unpaid, part-timers that have a willful administration with *a* plan already to go. Is it a case of inertia? Too much momentum among all the players? Is it about horsetrading, political favors, and the promise of future support for someone’s next career move?
Whenever I see this much cognitive dissonance coming from a political body, I start wondering what the hidden forces really are. That’s not conspiratorial thinking – just realism. When I engage in conversation and sense false listening, or listening for the purpose of telling me why I’m wrong, I wonder.
Anyway, the 16th school CAN be on the table. Any doors that are closed or partially closed can be opened if there were the political will. Political will happens when there is enough pressure.
The powers that be are forgetting that, among other things, the swing voter group they need for any future override has a high overlap with the group of folks who think we can do much better with the Zervas project.
Losing that swing voter group is a big price to pay for a mega commuter Zervas.
Building a 16th school in the Upper Falls area would impress this voter group and with a relatively low financial impact ensure that many millions of dollars could be tapped in the future.
The pressure from this group may be deflected now but it cannot be deflected at future override votes, which will be necessary if the student population keeps on increasing or we need to make the kind of educational improvements Needham, Brookline, … have achieved.
Keeping the swing voters on board should be a key long term goal of city government.
Doing a small scale expansion of Zervas and building a 16th school would have a huge return on investment not only in capacity expansion and the community effects, Bob Burke explained so well, but in ensuring that future real needs of the city will receive a supportive voter response.
What Marie said.
St. Elizabeth’s Center, Bob mentioned, is for sale???? That would be a terrific spot for a small neighborhood school. I’ve also been interested in setting up a K-3 school, if the square footage and program requirements don’t meet the needs for a K-5 at that location. We have LOTS of new families moving into Upper Falls, lots of toddlers and many babies on the way. It’s just one of those out of the box ideas that seems to get shut down. It would be great to have a smaller, safe, easy to walk to school for our youngest students. Perhaps, the redistricting, or buffer zones, will work well by the time the 4th and 5th graders move up.
@Jo-Louise,
Have you talked with Jerry Reilly about your K-3 idea? With his amazing record of accomplishment in creating out-of-the-box facilities and institutions for the good of the community, I would bet he could make it happen — and it would be fun, cost-effective, and first-class. 😉
Steve-The 16th school is a very popular option in a certain section of the city. However, that’s not the case in other parts of the city where the overcrowding and poor conditions will be ignored for many years if this option were to be put into place.
It’s easy on this blog to assume that everyone agrees with you, but that’s simply not the case. There are no “hidden forces”. People just disagree that building a 16th school is a good citywide option. Waban is a bit of an enclave that remains somewhat separate from the larger city, so it’s not hard to imagine that residents of this village might miss the perspective of the larger city.
Jane,
A 16th school would add 400-425 seats and hugely increase our capacity.
That draws population from the surrounding schools and helps relieve pressure across the district.
Zervas, Bowen, Countryside, Angier and Memorial-Spaulding would feel the immediate relief and they in turn can then provide relief to their neighbor schools.
There is an effect which spreads across the system.
Steve F does not have some parochial Waban only perspective.
He sees the larger picture in a way which some current SC members might well emulate.
Sorry, Geoff, we just disagree.
I hope you’re enjoying your new home and community.
Jane
Love the K-3 re-using space in St. Elizabeth’s idea!
What am I missing here? Weren’t there three override votes 18 months ago, one of which included Zervas? Does anyone really believe that vote somehow meant, “Zervas, or a 16th school, or some other such option? If Zervas is not done, who really thinks the city will step up and say, “OK, let’s go to the voters again for a 16th school? That is just not going to happen, and if it were to, it would and should be voted down.
Time is an important ingredient here. We do not have the time to restart a process, even if that had merit.
Karen N talks in circles and makes huge assumptions that whatever she values that makes newton special “historically,” whatever her “long range vision and character” are for Newton, whatever the catalyst is that makes Newton taxpayers happy and what the underestimated, average Newton voter wants are all the same as hers. I beg to disagree. (Historically, there have been many different reasons people wanted to live in Newton.) What are connected neighborhoods and connected communities anyway because the “genuine neighborhood school” she values obviously differs from those in other communities. She obviously doesn’t value the Conservation Commission and it’s bureaucratic exceptions to building in wetlands.
Steve Feinstein too puts us Newtonites in one basket by proclaiming “the trust of the voters has been violated” because of a “wasteful, wrong-headed, unnecessary Zervas project, squandering $40 million.” He’s also sure “we” are sheep just roaming around and the poor SC is being bamboozled by the Administration and if we’d just persevere through the cognitive dissonance we could do what he is sure we should all agree is right.
Joanne is sure a conspiracy is afoot that leads her to post the overcrowding of schools is the fault of stowaway students and the Metco Program.
Bob Burke is certain the future of overrides is doomed because the tax payers in Newton will revolt if Zervas is rebuilt and is certain his ideas for a new school in Upper Falls have not been considered, but should be because he knows what’s right for Newton.
Joyce is just nicely asking questions and doesn’t think any of these or others questions have been asked before, but she’s already picking out colors for the modulars and kicking the Mayor out the door.
Geoff also knows what the taxpayers and voters really want and it’s not this particular mega school. He agrees future overrides will be toast if this plan succeeds, but takes it a bit farther still with veiled threats of dire circumstances if they don’t get what he says they all want. He softens, as he adds that he is certain his way is the best way for the city as a whole and if only we, and the SC, could find a way out of our fog and recognize that in the long term he knows best, then the voters will be happy and the city will be saved.
To some it all up. These condescending commenters get their way or they take their balls and go home.
As we’ve seen, the wording of the Zervas override was so open you could drive a truck through it. It could be interpreted as finding a solution for the “Zervas population”.
I will read the CIP. However, since it is not an “Educational Improvement Plan” I can assume that it is only about buildings and facilities, not restoring the programs that we have lost over the past 15 years+ or doing something so that we are no longer an educational embarrassment when it comes to full day kindergarten. With Wellesley offering genuine full day kindergarten, there is no other district of quality that we can serve up as a believably comparable example to vouch for our pitiful pedagogical, increasingly backward/absurdly elitist/ achievement-gap-creating stance when it comes to not supporting publicly-funded early education even though numerous studies prove that it has a massive return on investment.
Will a focus on buildings mean that we will not be restoring the educational programing losses of the past decade that the communities that we compare ourselves to (Brookline, Wellesley, Belmont, etc.) already restored within the last five? When Brookline put up an override for elementary world languages, their schools were ranked as “1” in condition by the MSBA, while the majority of Newton schools were ranked at 2, with Angier and Cabot coming in at a practically third-world “3”(embarrassing for an affluent community such as Newton).
Jane, I’m sorry but in the past 15 years that I have lived in Newton, we have NEVER had an override that was actually about improving EDUCATION or restoring/advancing the scope of educational programming as Brookline and Wellesley’s overrides have. The big one that passed before the one that failed was an operational override that went directly to teacher salaries and benefits while cut world languages were not restored, and Newton didn’t progress in adopting anything that improved our educational offerings or program — not full day kindergarten, not world languages nor expanding AP and lab classes at the high school level. Instead, parents paid increasing fees, including fees for what I consider to be essential things like elementary music instruction during the school day. The next override was about reacting to overcrowding and tearing down 100+ year old buildings that had benefitted from “Newton style” maintenance — minimal maintenance so that that money could be used to finance teacher/administrator benefits and salary increases.
As a Southside middle school parent, every time I drove up to Oak Hill to see another middle school across the street I’d ask myself, “How did Newton residents let anything as stupid as two middle schools across the street from each other happen?” As a citizen I see myself at an important point in time, before ground is broken and money spent on Zervas. I feel like I am at this historically crucial moment before a really stupid decision to trash our village school model for an oversized commuter school model becomes the norm.
Karen – Unbeknownst to any of us, the monies from the “big one” went into a pot to fund the new NNHS, depleting the maintenance budget. That’s one of the reasons the elementary schools are in such disrepair. Ken Parker was the one who informed the residents about that in 2006.
As I mentioned before, the town of Brookline took care of its capital needs in the late 80’s and 90’s so it then had the capacity to have overrides to address programs. Newton, on the other hand, let its school buildings deteriorate during that same period of time. So now the needs of the buildings has risen to the top of our “need to do ASAP” pile.
Meanwhile, things aren’t so rosy in Brookline. They’re having more than their share of struggles.
In fact, the city wanted to place the fourth middle school at Cold Spring Park, but a group of neighbors threatened to file a lawsuit that would have put the project for an estimated 5 years. Of course, they had the funds for a lawsuit. The city simply couldn’t wait that long, and we ended up with 2 middle schools next to each other. So before you go blaming the city, you might want to consider the effect of your neighbors’ actions.
Question for the knowledgable ones – Does the school projections explicitly factor in the 40B projects on the horizon? Wells Ave, St. Phillips Neri etc?
Late night writing again…
neighbors threatened to file a lawsuit that would have put the project in court for an estimated 5 years
@Marti. This is getting to be what Mike Harrington, the same Mike Harrington that authored “The Other America” <used to call the Crazy Hour. It comes just before the end of a contentious debate when emotions fray and charges and counter charges are thrown wildly. Things had been rather civil and certainly respectful until your last post.
I'll let the others respond to what you said about them if they wish. I can only comment on what you said about me. I never said that future overrides would fail if Zervas is constructed according to current plans. I said they would likely fail if the City didn't get this right. That's a big difference. and I'm certain I implied that I wasn't certain what would ultimately turn out to be the case.
And I'm sorry if a spirited defense of the Upper Falls community comes across to you and some others as condescending. You may think so, but I have a hunch that most of the folks in Upper Falls don't share that opinion. My only complaint is that I wish I had said it earlier.
Bob, it’s interesting you bring up The Other America. You insist the “right way” to handle overcrowding in schools, according to you (you did say you agreed with Steve Feinstein) is to build a new neighborhood school rather than expanding Zervas. Which group that Mike Harrington wrote about would have any influence in their city government’s decisions on the location or size of schools? And the debate became contentious when some stopped debating and started stating that their opinions are the only “right” ones, that they are the voice of what Newton communities and voters want, that any other way is squandering $40, and that if you don’t agree with them you are sheep who are having the wool pulled over our eyes. All I did was point out what was being said and that I think it was condescending. I don’t see how that is not being civil or disrespectful.
Concerning your impassioned concerns about Upper Falls, I think you did a great job of articulating the community’s needs. I think you have valid points that need to be addressed quickly. My comment only pointed out that, like several others, you seem sure that your idea about using Braceland Field had not been fully considered because the ones making the decisions aren’t doing their job.
$40 million, sorry
I think that Marti’s personal attacks take this thread in the wrong direction.
So let’s keep on debating ideas, not attacking people.
There is a lot at stake here for Newton in seeing how we can best solve problems.
I rarely if ever disagree with Bob Burke, so this will be a first. There have been some disparaging comments made about people who support the city plan. As an example, folks who want to implement the city plan are called “sheep, wandering around our villages, mumbling that you can’t fight city hall” rather than acknowledging that we just plain disagree. People who agree with the plan are told that it’s a “a really stupid decision”, not a difference of opinion. Or how about this: ” the School Committee are essentially unpaid, part-timers.”
All of this is just part of a discussion of an issue people feel passionately about. But we survive and carry on with the discussion. You’re a beloved member of the community and haven’t ever been the target of so much as a sling or arrow on V14 before, but it happens all the time to others. Not to worry – it’s water off a duck’s back. In fact, this one hasn’t been too bad.
Marti and Jane – You are distorting my “sheep” remark to make it into a different point that you can criticize. I was responding to the attitude expressed in “a 16th school is off the table.”, just as people say “you can’t fight city hall”. All I was saying was that if people WANT the 16th school discussed, then they can try to make that happen. I hear this all the time. “Why are they doing this? Why don’t they just build a new school?” “The train has left the station.” “They’ll do what they want.”
I’m saying IF you don’t like what the city is doing, THEN speak up. But you changed that to mean “anyone who doesn’t agree with me is a sheep.”
If you want people to consider your argument, give an honest argument. Don’t bury fallacy in rants against your opponents. Argue on the merits.
Steve – that was hardly a rant. Your last comment was much clearer and I appreciate that. The first comment implied that anyone who didn’t fight for a 16th school was lacking in courage which is simply not the case. If people want to discuss having a 16th school, that’s fine with me. Have at it. I hear the opposite opinion all the time – why aren’t they moving on with the approved plan? In truth, we both probably live in our own echo chambers.
Through another lens, Marti’s was merely pointing out that the slings and arrows were going in both directions. From my perspective, it’s been a pretty civil but pointed discussion about a topic that some people in one section of the city feel very strongly about. I do think it’s important to remember that residents in other sections of the city have different opinions, and one of those opinions is that the new Zervas School must be part of a citywide solution to the overcrowding of the elementary schools.
I did think it was very disrespectful for you to call the School Committee unpaid part-timers. We happen to be fortunate to have SC and BOA members who are willing to give up family and work time to serve the city.
Reasonable people can differ on how they balance the pros and cons of a 490-student Zervas compared to alternatives, and I think this also applies to the larger vision for enlarging a number of the other elementary schools to at least 450-student capacity. My concern is that when the city asks voters for the “extra” money through overrides to fund that “vision”, I believe they have an absolute responsibility to make it as clear as possible what the money will be used for. If the city voters as a whole truly understand the various alternatives and vote for the overrides, so be it. But at least on this last override, details of that “vision”, in my opinion, were not adequately spelled out, either in the override-associated documents or at the meetings. (I went to two of those meetings, which were well-attended). Although it is now clear (from looking through minutes of SC meetings that occurred prior to the override) that a 450-student Zervas was part of the broader elementary school vision, that student number was not mentioned in the documents or presentations. (For those that feel that a slide that mentioned 80, 00 square feet for Zervas was sufficient detail for voters, I disagree.) I guess everyone can decide for themselves why the 450 (or 490) number was not included.
A few other comments on the response to the Aldermen questions: 1) While it may be the case that a “complete” traffic study requires finalization of the site plan, I believe a preliminary study should have been performed (by a completely independent firm) taking into account the two main options regarding the blue zone lane—i.e. widening Beethoven or not. If such a study concluded that there would be unacceptable gridlock and backup on Beethoven due to the addition of 150+ students who are not within easy walking distance, then the whole notion of a 490 student building would have to be re-thought. 2) Looking at the numbers in the Executive Summary table, it appears that the major growth in student numbers over the next 4 years will be at the high school and not K-5 elementary level; 3) It appears that in most states, the “recommended minimum size” (area-wise) for a student body of 500 would be around 10 acres. In my experience, much of the current playing area at Zervas has been devoid of grass much of the time due to heavy foot traffic concentrated in too small an area, and it doesn’t appear that the current plans create much change in the ratio of playing area to the number of students.
Jane – What I said was not disrespectful. And I do appreciate the public service of each of our elected officials.
I wrote “In this case, it’s the SC that has no will to fight NPS. Maybe it’s that the School Committee are essentially unpaid, part-timers that have a willful administration with *a* plan already to go. Is it a case of inertia? Too much momentum among all the players?”
What I’m saying is professional educators in NPS do the 40 hr/wk work of running the school system, analyzing and planning for future needs. The SC sets some top level goals, and they review plans and approve money. The LRFP was done by a hired architecture firm. The SC is like the board of directors for the NPS. They hire the CEO, e.g.
So asking them to make a huge change, like building a 16th school instead of a larger Zervas is asking them to go against NPS administration, and against a building plan that has been in the works for years. Hence my question “Is it a case of inertia?” and my wondering “maybe” changing the course that NPS is on + the history of planning is more than can be expected of a part-time board of directors that seem to be relatively OK with what we’re doing.
But frankly, these questions are really rhetoric on my part. I’m expressing the basic fact that I don’t understand why we are doing what we’re doing. What could possibly be pushing us down this path of spending $40 million for 170 seats and $2.7 million to move a few parking spaces off the street that are not even used by teachers? It boggles my mind.
Once again, your expanded explanation makes a great deal of sense, and I appreciate hearing it. At issue, however, is what is fact and what is opinion. It’s a fact that my opinion is that the city should buy the 3 properties and expand Zervas. It’s also a fact that I believe any elementary school district that receives a new building or comprehensive renovation must, in and of itself, be part of the citywide solution to overcrowding and that the question of a 16th school is a separate issue altogether.
Passage of the override has changed the game for Sandy Guryan and the NPS. Now flush with extra cash they and the SC can spend money more liberally than in the past decade. Very little checks and balances on their decisions now.
Community resistance is the last resort let’s just hope the sheep are more discerning about Newton’s future.
Now THAT was meant as an insult. I voted yes as an informed voter and am happy to see the roads being repaired and new elementary schools being built. Once again, we should be able to disagree on an issue and not have one side or the other demeaned. I’ve been called a lot of names in this city over the years, but sheep has never been one of them. 😉
Jane, you are no sheep. You do your homework, you have a viewpoint, and you advocate for your viewpoint. We disagree, but I don’t think anyone is calling you a sheep.
No, Jane, Marti,, Steve F. and Steve S. are not sheep by any stretch of the imagination. There’s a bit of tiger in all of them and I do not mean that in a pejorative sense at all. And to Marti, I heard Mike Harrington use the term “Crazy Hour” in reference to the emotions that always seem to crop up near the close of a debate or political campaign. I shouldn’t have used it in this debate and really took what he said out of context.
In the previous instance, it was an attempt by Harrington to bring the old American Socialist Party into the Democratic Party during the mid-1970’s. That produced a gathering in New York of old Eugene Debs and Norman Thomas type Democratic Socialists, new and much younger reform Socialists, leftie New Deal Democrats like me, some very interesting Jewish German Bund Socialists who survived Hitler, Catholic Socialists who worked with Dorothy Day, and a varied assortment of other free spirits. Our meetings were repeatedly harassed by an assortment of Trotskyites, a few old line Stalinists, and the followers of Lyndon LaRouche, one of whom I helped tackle to the ground as he tried to rush the platform where Harrington and others were presiding. It was Harrington who rose up and brought order back to the proceedings with that note about the “Crazy Hour.”
Everyone in this debate has been motivated by what they believe best for both students and the community. I’m a member of the Newton Highlands Area Council and I’m extremely proud of the work on an alternative plan that was put together with amazing order by our President Srdj Nedeljkovic, member Steve Feinstein and also by Bruce Henderson who is a former Zervas parent and leader of that School’s PTA for many years. I know there were others, but these are the three I was able to follow directly. In an amazingly short period of time, they were able to produce a credible and disciplined alternative without being able to tap the usual public financial support or planning and engineering assistance. And they were always working against the clock. And I believe they have every right and every responsibility to keep articulating their position right up to the time the full Board of Aldermen gives Plan A either an up or a down. This, to my mind, is what citizenship is all about.
One final suggestion. A good part of the reason the competing visions of what’s best for Zervas have received such high visibility is because of the Village 14 Blog. I think this blog has become sufficiently mature that it would handle something like an incremental planning process. Part of the argument here has been just how truly open the debate over enlarging the school has been in terms of timely substance. I don’t want to get into that here but I’m wondering if it might be possible during future planning debates of this substance to invite the public into each segment of the decision making by posting proposals, status reports, early warning alerts, and/or disagreements clearly and openly as posts on this blog. You are simply not going to get a lot of people (even those who may ultimately be the most affected) to come out at night and take part in formal planning sessions with all their power point presentations etc; but they might be willing to look at and comment on key elements on line. I’ve been through this in my own career and know you just don’t get people to focus until something they don’t like or didn’t expect hits them blindside.
Because of a neighborhood meeting I needed to attend, I wasn’t able to be at last night’s joint meeting of Finance and Public Facilities. But I am informed that the City was not able to reach agreement with the owner of the corner lot. So, it looks like on Monday, the Board of Aldermen will be voting on the acquisition of just two lots, based on a site plan that was apparently revised at the last minute, which has even fewer parking spaces than the A1.2c plan that did not require expansion of the site. This causes me to question yet again whether we should be moving forward with Zervas–ahead of Cabot–on an expedited basis, at least not until the possible purchase/taking of the third lot gets sorted out.
Perhaps someone who was at the meeting can fill in some details.
Bob, I’ll admit to having a bit of tiger in my tank and sometimes pouncing a little too high. And now I’m intrigued with your exploits in the 70!s, and a little jealous too.
It is seeming to me that the plans for Zervas may not have been articulated well enough in the beginning. I understood that the only reason Zervas was being considered for rebuilding before other schools in worse condition was that it had the potential to handle a larger student population in a central location. It may be that I am more of a digger into details than some voters; maybe I have more time or maybe it’s just the devil’s in the details writer in me.
Right now, I am having a hard time understanding why Angier and Cabot seemed to go through this process so much smoother than Zervis, why Zervas was selected at all over 2 other more needy schools, and why Zervas is listed in the Long Range Planning Report as 5.28 acres with room for expansion when I believe it, at this point, has only 3,5 acres that are useable. Maybe Zervas isn’t where all this effort should be going at all.
The document that is the subject of this thread is no longer available on the Newton Web site (at least at present). Other documents are available, so it doesn’t seem to be a general computer failure. Anyone have any information on this?
I think this is it. http://www.newtonma.gov/civicax/filebank/documents/61530
Though I do love Bob and his history lessons, I have to express my concern about several parts of his message.
Every resident has a right to provide input to all aspects of city life and the work at City Hall, and every School Committee member and Alderman will tell you they hear from me often about various issues. However, when a certain group of citizens is given a right that others have been denied, we’ve crossed some very uncomfortable boundaries. Citizens attempted to provide alternative plans to the NNHS project and the BOA and Mayor told them in no uncertain terms that this was not acceptable. Suddenly, out of the blue, we find out that, not only is it okay for citizens to propose site plans, but they are welcome. When was the policy changed? Did the change happen publicly or in a private meeting that did not comply with the open meeting law? Or did a group of aldermen just decide to do what they wanted to do without a policy in place at all? If that’s the case, who let THAT happen?
Secondly, neither the citizens’ group nor the NHAC ever made an attempt to contact the staff at Zervas School to ask for input. In fact, the staff found out about this plan just this Tuesday – two days ago. So the citizens who spent so much time coming up with a new site plan never bothered to tap into the knowledge and insight of those who spend their days in elementary schools. This lack of transparency is troubling at best. From the point of view of a teacher, it’s hard to believe it never occurred to the NHAC or the citizens’ group to let the teachers know that they were going to present an alternate plan to the BOA.
Which brings me to my final point. Submitting school building plans for review by a BOA committee is completely different from providing input into the process. By accepting this citizens’ plan for review and vetting, the Board of Alderman has invited chaos to school building projects in the future. When it’s time to develop plans for Cabot School, you can bet that there’ll be multiple citizen proposals that the BOA will have to review and vet. How does the Board accept the plans of some groups for review and deny the same right to others? Such a process will pit neighbor against neighbor, as various groups vie to have their favorite plan chosen for consideration, and will be contentious and divisive to no good end.
Really glad to hear no one thinks I’m a sheep.
Thanks, Marti. Looks like they changed it’s location (although the search engine on the Newton Web site was unable to locate the new link). Greg R. may want to change the link at the top of this page.
THM, I was at last night’s meeting. I will give you my take since no one else has offered you a response..
It appears the city is still working to purchase the 1338 Beacon Street property. The committee voted in a non-unanimous affirmative on two votes to allocate the funds needed to purchase the other two properties. The dollar number was reduced to reflect just the two other properties. This was done so the matter can be placed in front of the full BOA next Monday. Alderman Gentile tried to create the verbiage with some latitude in case the city and the property owner can reach an agreement prior to Monday night, in which case the dollar number would be increased to include all three properties.
There was a brief discussion regarding the impact of proceeding with only two added properties. Various people indicated that since the land at 1338 Beacon is designated for parking within the Plan A proposal, the direct impact would be a reduction of roughly 30 parking spots. Some non-vetted ideas were offered as to how to replace some of those spaces onsite and some in the neighborhood. The professionals will be providing updated, vetted recommendations to the BOA on Monday.
One other observation, Alderman Ciccone said he expects the same level of effort regarding onsite parking will be expended on future building projects, specifically the Cabot School.
Someone, who was sitting at the table, may be able to confirm, add to, or correct my comments.
Very bad news regarding Cabot and the possible taking of more properties. Cabot relies heavily on street parking. The school site offers very scant parking. Any discussion of eminent domain would not be welcome to Cabot abutters.
The Zervas property purchases sets a very difficult precedent for future school expansion and development.
I believe that the 3 homes ought not to be torn down because school officials are unable to think through a more realistic scheme for addressing school growth needs
@Patrick, thanks. That is more or less what I heard, including the suggestion the city should go all “Joni Mitchell” on Cabot.
Jane, this is not new policy at all. Anything at all can be presented to the Aldermen, and Aldermen can and do open the floor to comments and consider those comments in their deliberations. It sounds like you follow city politics to know just how easily an item can get derailed. In fact, citizens can create their own petitions to be considered by committees, regardless of merit. You wonder why it takes so long to get anything done? In this case, there is no motion to vote on plan B, only the acquisition of property.
>>> the city should go all “Joni Mitchell” on Cabot.
“Going Joni Mitchell” was one of my favorite V14 lines of the last month. Bring ’em on.
Bob Burke’s always great on these threads. When temperatures starts to rise and tempers start to fray you can count on him to go War (“Why can’t we be friends”) on us.
Joshua Norman’s been mostly silent on the Zervas thread, I’d have expected him to be going all Beatles on us (“Be thankful I don’t take it all, Cos I’m the taxman”)
It’s been a good thread, but after reading 100’s of comments I must admit that I occasionally want to go all Talking Heads (“Burning down the house”) on it.
@Jerry, for the record, I lifted that from someone else on this thread (I cannot recall whom), which is why I put quotation marks around it. You can dock me a week’s pay.
@Jane, I am having a hard time following your logic on how you can reject the idea of input from city citizens. And now that you have jumped to “lack of transparency” I would like to inform folks that this is not quite true. The NHNAC has had discussions on the plan, created by elected officials and private citizens, and endorsed by the council over several meetings that have been posted like all other meetings subject to open meeting laws. Minuets of the meetings are also posted on the city website, although generally a month after the meeting. I do not know if Zervis employees were or were not involved but the idea of an opaque process is not an appropriate description of how the plan came together.
Opps, Minutes are posted although posting Minuets would be cool.
Adam – We were denied the same opportunity to present options for a credible site plan in very explicit terms. If we are governed by laws and not people, then a change in leadership cannot explain away why this happened, or why people are finding out about this new plan through the grapevine at the 11th hour. Maybe it was due to precedent and not official policy, other residents were not aware that site plans could be presented to the BOA.
Perhaps it’s time for the BOA to clarify explicitly for the community what the parameters for citizen input are, and provide guidelines for how to provide more effective input. I’ve called, written, and met with a number of aldermen about various issues. They’ve thanked me for my comments, and reminded me that they were hearing from many people. However, in my 33 years living in Newton, no alderman has ever suggested that I submit an alternate plan to a proposed ordinance, site plan, traffic plan, etc. that was already in process as a means of providing input.
Groot – Zervas is part of a citywide solution to elementary school overcrowding. Therefore, any change should have been shared more broadly to the larger community. How it came about that the teachers and staff were not included in the process is a complete mystery to me. These two issues lead me to believe there was a lack of transparency. My goodness, I live 2 blocks from Zervas and I didn’t know about it. This decision affects the entire city and should have been shared with the entire community. As you well know, I’m all for citizen input, but I question how this happened as it did and why major stakeholders were not informed about it.
If citizens’ plans are included in the mix of Cabot School site plans, you can bet it will be a mess – and parking will be just the tip of the iceberg.
I guess Village 14 won’t be adopting “Don’t Rock the Boat” (So I’d like to know where you got the notion,
said I’d like to know where you got the notion) as its theme song. We like rocking the boat.
As the author of “going all Joni Mitchell on us” I hereby release all rights to the phrase and place the words squarely in the public domain. (Now go all Beatles and “Say the word[s] and you’ll be free…say the word[s] and be like me…”)
Once this is over, we need a blog party. With a dunk tank. Outside. In January. 😉
@Jane, without trying to offend, you suggested that transparency is lost since you had not heard about the meetings which is similar to what folks are saying about the information describing the recent override. A serious question, is it the city’s responsibility to make sure everyone knows about upcoming planing meetings? (NHNAC discussions on “Plan B” or Newton on the meetings that would tell people the override is for a tear down and new school at Zervis) Or is it the responsibility of residents to look out for city meetings that would inform them on topics of interest? It may not be as black and white as some have posted on these threads.
Jane – If you have a plan for Zervas or Cabot you’d like to propose, why don’t you create it and mail it in to all the relevant officials? Nobody is stopping you. I don’t know why you keep hammering away at this. It’s a free country. Do what the NHNAC group has done: we thought long and hard about alternative ideas, fleshed them out together, wrote it up and sent it to the ZSBC, SC and BOA with our rationale. Some of those folks thought the plan had no merit and dismissed it. Others drew the correct conclusions. 🙂 If your plan has merit, perhaps the city will be the better for it. But instead of dwelling on your NNHS experience, make a contribution to the discussion with some creative ideas for how to fit too many students into too small a space.
And Jane…if you do submit a plan without extensive public notification, I will not be upset about your lack of transparency.
Jane – I disagree with the way that you’re framing this. From where I’m sitting this all appears like normal, healthy, useful, citizen input in the normal process.
The NSC presented an initial design and various groups had concerns about various aspects of the presented plan. A group of folks had well grounded concerns about the way the whole drop-off/pick-up was going to work in the design. They put together a bunch of useful supporting documents and information about that particular issue, went to their elected officials, wrote letters to the Tab, etc to raised their concerns. The school committee and the design team looked at, agreed there was a better way, and adjusted the design accordingly. That’s a good thing.
Next up is what’s being discussed here. It’s a very similar situation. I think what may have muddied the water and caused all the concerns with you is the term “Plan B” and the fact that the proponents generated a simple graphic to answer what would it look like if the building was turned around and the parking re-configured. Like with the previous issue the proponents are asking the school committee to consider whether there’s a better approach to one aspect of the existing design. Maybe they’ll agree, maybe not, but if they do it’s about tweaking the design-in-progress by the hired architect, not starting all over again.
As Groot points out, all of this has been done via a very open process thru a body of elected officials – the Newton Highlands Area Council. As I understand it, the statutory role of the Area Councils is to do things just like this – i.e. advise the rest of the city government about any concerns local to their constituents. It sounds to me like they were just doing the job that they were elected to do.
As I recall several skilled people did prepare alternate designs for NNHS. Sangiolo was one person who offered a most viable alternative to the present school.
Jane, Jerry articulated most of my comments so I will add just a few extra points.
1) The proposal put forth by NHAC includes the exact same building of 24 classrooms with the expected capacity of 490+ students and all the identified educational programs. You keep talking about communicating with the whole city. Their proposal dealt strictly with the siting of the building within the local neighborhood. That does not impact the entire city. While I do not believe they withheld any information from the general public intentionally, they did perform an excellent job communicating with the local community including going door-to-door inviting participation in their survey.
2) Your comment “My goodness, I live 2 blocks from Zervas and I didn’t know about it.” should be directed at the Waban Area Council rather than the members of the NHAC. Zervas (and your house) is actually within the WAC’s boundaries. I just checked their website. The WAC does “not have a position at this time” regarding the Zervas project. They are still “currently studying concerns from the neighborhoods and the consideration of the City, School Committee, and Design Review Committee”. The NHAC is trying to stay ahead of this issue by offering ideas before final decisions are made. The WAC did make an informational update to their website after this week’s Finance Committee meeting, yet it lacks any recommendations for the decision-makers to consider. It is my understanding that the area councils were created to not only provide information to the residents but also to provide the residents’ input to the other elected city officials. As Jerry and others have pointed out, the NHAC and the WAC are made up of elected people.
3) As far as groups providing transparency and access to meetings, the March “public” meeting was announced to the parents of current Zervas parents. Local home owners not matching that criteria (including those of us who spent 13 years supporting the ZPTA while our kids were students there) were not informed by the ZDRC. Perhaps the NHAC could teach the ZDRC how to reach out to the local home owners in a more effective way. I would say that may be too late given the current status of the project.
Dear Jane,
The NNHS design turned out to be very controversial and has left a bad taste in many citizens and officials mouths. More input of the type you proposed might well have avoided this situation and the acrimony that resulted from the project. The input from the NHAC might well prove beneficial to the Zervas project. I have rarely, if ever, seen projects that were harmed by citizen input. Rather most projects that received such input have benefited from it. Certainly the School closings of decades ago which were done over massive citizen protests that they would leave the city without sufficient space when school age population rebounded
were catastrophic errors. The by-word of the Community Action Movement was “Maximum feasible participation.” As a Community Action Program employee of 30 years, I still think it’s an expression to live by.
Sincerely,
Brian Yates
The accusation that the NNHAC withheld information about its “Plan B” is utter nonsense. We sent copies of the plan to the ZSBC, then the full BOA and SC, and then Bruce Henderson posted links to all of the plans and follow up explanations on Village 14 within a couple of days. Almost from the moment the plan was released it was the center of an active discussion thread on this very web site.
To the point that input from the community contributed to changes in the design plan, that community involvement had a great deal to do with moving away from Plan A1.2c which is almost the same as the NH citizens submittal. Some of those concerned the bus lane and the back of the school being too close to abutting neighbors because of the negative impact of noise and view, the unappealing view from both Beacon and Beethoven at mainly the larger building, the entrance facing Beethoven instead of a more welcoming approach for students, parents and neighbors by creating a community feel, addressing current problems of school vehicles on the street, blocked driveways, and speeding by putting parking on site. All of these concerns have been resolved with the current site/design plan. NONE of them are addressed in the Newton Highlands plan. Why is that?
The fact that the current plan was devised over months with much community involvement, that the NH proposal goes backward to a plan that it seems the community didn’t like and that this proposal didn’t appear until 9/14 and effectively stalled any progress causes concern. Most of the members who backed this plan are now stressing the need for a smaller school and an additional school. No one on this board is arguing the merits of “Plan B.” The minutes of the NHAC meetings and the survey done in Newton Highlands concerning Zervas, mostly center around the need to keep “walkable” schools, a “heated” discussion with School Committee members last February about a 16th school, a complaint that the School Committee has not produced the reasoning behind the 2007 Long Range Facitities decision to select the option to spread growth evenly around Newton and increase capacity at most schools, including a new, larger Zervas, rather than the option to add a 16th large school and build a new Zervas without increasing capacity.
Where are all the impassioned pleas for “Plan B?”
Marti:
– A1.2c bears little resemblance to Plan B except the orientation of the building.
– The entrance facing the south is more desirable, not less – because it has more sunshine and 80% of the students arrive at the school along Beethoven, from the south.
– The buses shouldn’t be a problem if the Beacon Stret houses stay because that’s the way it’s been for years – the buses drive behind the houses. And they’re there for only a very short part of the day, and only on school days. Maybe 180 hours in a year.
– The current city plans were devised in a chaotic way with each meeting’s presentation reworking the high level site plan in response to comments from a very small set of people – committee members and alarmed neighbors.
– The plans never converged on a single version that was acceptable to the ZSBC itself. Instead when the summer came, the vote to move into schematic design phase was done without an acceptable solution. Over the summer they worked on ideas that became the City’s plan including the three properties. But even that plan was problematic – it had not enough play space for the increase in students, there was no traffic study, yet several pedestrian safety issues, the entrance is in complete shadow all day long, the gym is far away from the playing field, and 26% of the building footprint is in the 100′ wetlands buffer zone.
When you say the “community didn’t like” Plan B (which you mistakenly equate to A1.2c), what are you referring to? Most people were not aware of the City’s plans at the time, and most people in the NHNAC survey that were aware disapproved of the plans by 2:1. So maybe the community didn’t like any of the plans including A1.2c. Plan B was created later, after the survey. And it was shared widely in the first week of September, not 9/14.
Patrick – I’m very well aware that I live in the area of the Waban Area Council. I voted in the election last November. It was merely offhand comment pointing out that I live in close proximity to families with kids at the school at never heard about it. Of greater concern to me is that the Zervas staff never heard about it or more importantly included in the process or even invited to a NHAC meeting.
The area councils were created to address village concerns, not citywide issues. The Zervas project is part of a citywide comprehensive plan to address the overcrowding at elementary schools throughout the city. The Highlands Area Council came up with a plan that benefitted its village only. It then expanded its reach into proposing a 16th school in another village, which is outside the scope of its responsibilities. It then somehow forgot that there are teachers/staff that they could have and should have included in the process. Instead, they completely left the Zervas staff out of the process, and frankly, that is odd at best. Why would you not want to ask for input from the very people who know the most about the workings of an elementary school building?
So three issues – leaving the teachers out of the process, proposing a plan that involved another village, and removing Zervas from the solution to the citywide overcrowding problem – leads to questions about transparency. It appears that you want what no other school is getting – a comprehensive renovation without expansion while the other schools continue to deteriorate.
Steve – Once I found out about the citizens’ plan, I asked if I could submit a plan and was told it was too late. I do have a very credible plan that relieves elementary overcrowding and removes Zervas from the picture, as it seems the community does not want the school.
Brian – Just so people know, despite numerous emails to you about the NNHS project and other issues, I have never once received an email from you acknowledging my input. Not an email, not a call, nothing. You voted for the NN project, you got it, and now you’re complaining about the acrimony your vote brought about. Unbelievable. The first time you have ever responded to me was yesterday about this project.
Steve, you represent a set of perspectives remarkably different than those of every design and educational professional with Newton’s architect DPC, project manager JLA, the architects and engineers of the Design Review Committee, Newton’s Building Department, Newton Public Schools, and the professional staff and lay members who sit on the Zervas School Building Committee. This is quite a lineup of people to misunderstand the basics of good design.
Not that these 85 people must be right and you must be wrong, but rather that they do this for a living and they engage in a rigorous vetting process to sort through favorable and unfavorable design attributes. It is the combination of highly qualified individuals and rigorous process that gives strength to the results. Good buildings are done this way.
This process gives weight to various design options. For example, you are correct in pointing out that A1.2C and Plan B share a building orientation. But they both fail specifically because of this orientation, since the designers understand that the attributes of a single secure entrance, building position onsite, gathering courtyard that greets arrivers from two directions, and distance from residential properties, are an order-of-magnitude more important than the sun orientation of the courtyard.
The busses on Beethoven are OK “because that’s the way it’s been for years?” Really? Your colleagues on NHNAC have been saying that Beethoven doesn’t work now. The preferred plan addresses this fact while Plan B ignores it. Why is this?
The city’s plans “were devised in a chaotic way”? Have you ever observed the building design process? The best buildings evolve in uneven surges, with classic two-steps-forward-and-one-step-back motion. The excellent Angier emerged via this process. The Zervas project is emerging this way now. On projects with many constraints, this motion is a sign that designers are working a problem rather than forcing a solution. And thank you for noting that plans changed from one meeting to the next in response to input from committee members and neighbors. This is exactly how good design should happen.
“26% of the building footprint is in the 100′ wetlands buffer zone”. Steve, please share with me the significance of this statement. Do you know the weight this carries as an issue as compared to the Plan B recommendation of putting 28 cars within the 25’ wetlands buffer? Well the team that’s been working on this project does. They understand better than most of us what matters and what doesn’t. I think that’s why we are paying them a lot of money.
The Zervas design will continue to emerge. Some of the criticisms from you and other members of the public are points well taken, and they will likely influence the design. They don’t represent “proof” that this project is wrong and that we should stop it and go build a 16th school in Upper Falls. They are problems to solve on the way to producing a really good design. So for that contribution from you and your colleagues on the NHNAC, a sincere thank you.
What Steve Siegel said – so much better than I ever could.
Steve, you’re relying heavily on “argument from authority” (“so and so is an authority on the topic, the authority says X, X must be true”). It may be true that such people are right more often than lay people, but not necessarily.
For example, the experts you cite developed and incorporated the terrible idea of the interior drop-off circle in many earlier plans. I was one of the public commenters that spoke out against it as a local resident and NHNAC member, as did members of the Transportation Advisory Group (TAG), including the president of the NHNAC. Perhaps the NHNAC has a more valid perspective than you give us credit for.
And who were the expert traffic engineers that came up with the idea of widening Beethoven Ave based on a guess or hearsay that people double-park in the Blue Zone? I happen to know a lot about drop-offs, since I do them almost every school day. I’ve never seen a double-park drop-off — and in my talks with Zervas parents I’ve heard of only 2 examples in the last 2 years — and like most parents I would never think to double-park due to the obvious danger to my kids. A wider Beethoven accomplishes nothing except allowing more cars to drive faster by the school. Widening the street does not increase the size of the Blue Zone. It just pushes it out of the way of cars trying to make it through the light at Beacon. Anyway, drop-offs and pickups only happen for about 30 minutes per school day, so why sacrifice precious play area forever for a problem that is so fleeting?
I’ve been to most of the design review meetings and have been following the project closely all year. I’m not seeing any rigorous vetting process in action. I see a series of flawed design options, and they’re not necessarily in decreasing order of badness.
Meanwhile I hear a bunch of inaccurate arguments against Plan B, which still stands as valid proof that the property acquisitions are not needed.
For example, the knock that “Plan B has two main entrances” is very misleading. Both of the entrances lead into the same main lobby. The entrance for bus arrivals would be locked at all times except when badge-swiped by the staff person greeting the buses.
You said: “The busses on Beethoven are OK “because that’s the way it’s been for years?” Really? Your colleagues on NHNAC have been saying that Beethoven doesn’t work now. The preferred plan addresses this fact while Plan B ignores it. Why is this?”
The buses are not the problem on Beethoven Ave. When they do cause a problem, it’s only when they do their drop-off in the Blue Zone. In Plan B, they go on-site to drop the kids off. The real cause of congestion on Beethoven is cars queuing up to get into the Blue Zone when it’s full. Plan A does nothing to alleviate that.
You said: “26% of the building footprint is in the 100′ wetlands buffer zone”. Steve, please share with me the significance of this statement. Do you know the weight this carries as an issue as compared to the Plan B recommendation of putting 28 cars within the 25’ wetlands buffer? Well the team that’s been working on this project does. They understand better than most of us what matters and what doesn’t. I think that’s why we are paying them a lot of money.
First, a building within the wetlands buffer is an impervious structure that reduces natural drainage and creates storm water runoff. But a parking lot built near a wetland buffer using pervious pavement allows for filtration of storm-water runoff.
Second, it looks like up to 12,000 SF of the Plan A building would be in the wetlands buffer zone, which would be 34% of the footprint, not 26%. That’s a significant solid structure that would possibly impact the wetlands.
Third, only 1500-1900 SF — or about 15% — of Plan B’s parking lies within the 25’ wetlands buffer zone. That’s equivalent to 10-12 parking spaces. That impact on the wetlands is easily mitigated using pervious asphalt and appropriate drainage.
Finally, paying someone a lot of money does not guarantee good work. Let me know if you need examples.