Owen Krause (left) speaks with John Burns during the Cable TV studio open house, Sept. 25. (Photo by Lisa Aciukewicz)
The story behind Article 11 is not complicated: sometimes the best laid plans go awry, and projects go over budget. That seems to be the case with the new studio for Harvard Community TV (HCTV) nearing completion in the unused storage space of the Bromfield School basement.
The nearly finished studio, which has been praised by town officials, the School Committee, and School Council and fueled by hours of volunteer help, has exceeded its original $93,000 budget by an estimated $31,000, or roughly 33 percent. And in the absence of other funds, HCTV withdrew $22,000 from a cash account intended for equipment purchases in order to complete its work on the exterior entrance to the studio in time for the start of the 2013-14 school year. Article 11 asks the town to fund the project overrun, and proponents are expected to request a total of $36,000 when the motion is presented to town meeting.
As conceived, the new studio was to be funded with contributions from three sources: $27,000 from a school fund, $27,000 from the Rantoul Trust, and $39,000 from the Capital Stabilization and Investment Fund, the last specifically to make the exterior entrance handicapped-accessible. By using student teams from Montachusett Regional Vocational Technical School, manpower and resources from the Department of Public Works, and lots of volunteer labor, project leaders hoped to keep costs down.
But according to Bill Johnson, who has served as spokesman for the project this past year on budget matters, the unexpected withdrawal of Monty Tech teams in July and a decision by DPW Director Rich Nota to focus his department on the repaving of Ayer Road this fall, pushed the project over the edge. The project had to use outside contractors to finish the work, adding roughly $31,000 in unexpected costs. In addition, several project surprises, including unexpected modifications to the fire suppression system and ledge in a utility closet, added to the overall cost.
Until the withdrawal of Monty Tech and DPW, says Johnson, the project stayed “remarkably on budget.” “Everybody did the right thing,” he says.
