Pieter Hollenberg, Reagan Bissonnette and Dan Williams are residents of Concord and members of Rebuild at Rundlett.
If you haven’t heard the news, Rundlett Middle School needs to be replaced, and it needs to happen soon. Despite the Concord School Board recently announcing a letter of intent to purchase a parcel of land from CenterPoint Church on Clinton Street, it is not too late to Rebuild at Rundlett.
Rebuild at Rundlett is an initiative backed by hundreds of concerned citizens who support building a new middle school at the current Rundlett location on South Street.
Rebuild at Rundlett favors building a new middle school onsite at Rundlett based on the track record of the three recent and successful Concord school rebuilds — Abbot Downing, Christa McAuliffe and Mill Brook.
These 2012 construction projects came in well under budget, under bond, and on schedule. All three projects involved building or rebuilding on existing Concord School District property. While rebuilding at Rundlett would result in some temporary disruptions during construction, let’s choose the best location to serve Concord and its children for decades to come.
Rebuilding at Rundlett will decrease costs to taxpayers. The school district already owns the Rundlett Middle School property, whereas the CenterPoint property would need to be purchased. Additional infrastructure would be needed at the CenterPoint site to make it viable, including traffic signals and roadway widening.
Rebuilding at Rundlett will prevent increased traffic and congestion. The CenterPoint site is far from most neighborhoods with limited safe, non-motorized access.
Rebuilding at Rundlett will promote child safety. Clinton Street is known for high travel speeds, and a lack of pedestrian and bicycle facilities makes this location entirely unsafe for students to travel by foot or bicycle.
Rebuilding at Rundlett will preserve walkability, bikeability, and equity in access. Research shows walkability improves traffic safety, air quality, enhanced personal safety, long-term cost savings, and greater student academic achievement.
Rebuilding at Rundlett will protect the green resources, history, and character of our city. The CenterPoint land provides critical support for the last north/south wildlife corridor in Concord, connecting the White Farm area with the Russell-Shea and Cilley State Forests and the Turkey River. Once it’s developed, it’s lost.
One argument against Rebuild at Rundlett has been the assertion that the existing site is too small to build a new school while Rundlett remains in use. At the most recent April and May public meetings regarding the CenterPoint proposal, the school board incorrectly stated the existing site was only 11 acres.
Members of Rebuild at Rundlett brought the error to the district’s attention. The district’s engineer has since confirmed the correct parcel size is 22 acres, more than sufficient to Rebuild at Rundlett.
We don’t want to slow the wheels of progress. We want a new middle school building that all Concord students deserve. We want the district to meet an important July 1 deadline to apply for state building aid. We simply request that the school board remain true to their recent reassurances that the CenterPoint site is not a done deal.
In order to keep the option open to Rebuild at Rundlett, the school board must not name any significant site deficiencies for potential sites on the state building aid application, including Rundlett’s current location. According to Rebuild at Rundlett communications with the building aid grant program, any significant site deficiencies listed on the grant application, such as the prior stated incorrect acreage for Rundlett, would be binding.
Rebuild at Rundlett is encouraging all residents of Concord to ask the school board to do their due diligence before committing taxpayer dollars to this major project. The school board needs to complete traffic studies and Safe Routes to School assessments on both sites as well as an environmental assessment of the Clinton Street site. They need to provide an estimate of the off-site costs associated with the roads and infrastructure that will be required to locate a school on the already traffic-congested Clinton Street.
On June 15, the district’s architects presented new site plans and cost estimates confirming a new middle school could be successfully built at Rundlett.
The school board will be holding a public hearing to discuss where to build a new middle school on June 21st at 6 p.m. at 38 Liberty Street. Please join the over 300 Concord residents who have already expressed concerns about relocating the middle school to Clinton Street and advocate to Rebuild at Rundlett.