‘We have to be prepared’: Concord waits to find out fate of state building aid

The main entrance of Rundlett Middle School.

The main entrance of Rundlett Middle School. GEOFF FORESTER

By CHARLOTTE MATHERLY

Monitor staff

Published: 01-21-2025 5:14 PM

As the Concord Board of Education weighs where to place its new middle school, a big piece of the puzzle remains uncertain – and it isn’t up to them.

In preparing to build a new school, the board had applied for up to $48 million in building aid from the state. However, as the Legislature faces a substantial revenue shortfall and battles over how to comprise the state’s education funding model, whether any school building aid will be available is still being hashed out.

“We have a constitutional obligation to provide an adequate education,” Rep. Michael Cahill, a Newmarket Democrat, said during a hearing Tuesday on funding for building aid. “That also means an adequate building: a building without fire and life safety hazards, a building with sufficient space, a school that doesn’t have modular classrooms.”

Democrats like Cahill are proposing an increase to building aid from a max of $50 million to a minimum of $60 million per fiscal year. In its current version, the bill would exclude debt tails from that annual funding, meaning the whole $60 million could be put toward new project approvals. The state Department of Education awards grants for new school buildings and renovations.

Currently, however, the state budget includes no building aid. Commissioner Frank Edelblut left it out of the Department of Education’s request, saying he’d been asked to leave it blank and let the Legislature hash it out.

Meanwhile, districts like Concord wait and watch.

Concord is currently second on the waitlist for aid, and Pamela Walsh, president of the board, said she wants to be ready for it — if and when that funding is available. But she doesn’t want to jump the gun.

“My position is that we should not proceed, that we should not make a decision about proceeding past design, until we know about building aid,” Walsh said.

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Cost comparisons presented to the Concord Board of Education last week indicate that building a new school at the current South End location would carry a $164.6 million price tag, and building at the Broken Ground site would cost $156.5 million. Even if the state made $60 million available, Concord’s plan calls for spending more than double the state’s maximum cost per square foot, meaning Concord would receive less aid than it hoped.

Walsh said that if only part of their request is funded by the state, the board will have a choice to make. They could turn it down while keeping their spot on the waitlist, or they could proceed with less state aid.

“If they offer the full amount … we have to be prepared to proceed or go to the end of the list,” Walsh said.

The way the aid program works now, a chunk of the $50 million maximum per year first goes towards paying out bonds on school projects funded in previous years. It means far less than that is available for school projects annually, so Concord wouldn’t face much risk of having to turn down a complete offer.

Walsh also said she doesn’t know how or when the board will decide on the site for the new school but that a change in location won’t impact their chances for building aid. Choosing renovation over new construction, however, could force Concord to start its application process over again.

Cahill’s bill also seeks to reimburse school districts for building aid that they would’ve been eligible for had any funding been available during about a decade when the state placed a moratorium on building aid, and to roll over any extra unused funds at the end of each year.

Members of the Education Funding Committee on Tuesday expressed interest in tying building aid to other factors to spread it around more evenly: like adding it to the state’s base adequacy aid per student or basing it on a community’s property taxes. Cahill argued that the state should “protect property-poor communities,” which he said struggle with higher taxes to fund local schools.

David Trumble, a Democrat who ran unsuccessfully for the Senate in Weare, said state building aid helped his town rebuild a school that had been in violation of building codes. That wouldn’t have happened without state support, he said, and one dollar spent by the state also leverages two or three dollars locally.

He pointed to state statutes that require schools to meet certain building standards.

“You mandate that there be suitable schools in every town,” Trumble said. “I think when you mandate something, then there comes an obligation to help fund it.”

Some fear building aid could get cut completely in the next budget. Gov. Kelly Ayotte will present her draft of the budget next month; then, legislators make their edits.

Walsh said she doesn’t know what the board would do if building aid was off the table but said it’d warrant a discussion.

At this point, she said she’s still hopeful that the funding will come through but that nothing is certain.

“Some of the tax cuts have led to a hole in the budget that could very well impact the ability to fund building aid, along with other important things, including education, but we also know that every dollar of building aid is one less dollar that has to be raised through property taxes,” Walsh said. “We’re hopeful that the Legislature will meet its responsibilities to fund education adequately and to fund building aid adequately.”

 

Charlotte Matherly can be reached at cmatherly@cmonitor.com.