For weeks the School Building Committee has been telling voters that a key argument for preferring a new school to a renovated one is the high cost of any renovation. Building committee members have said that even the lowest-cost option would cost millions and leave the town with an outdated building good for only another 20 or 30 years at best.
But it turns out that the minimal option prepared by the committee went well beyond what many would have considered a bare-bones repair; on closer inspection it was found to include most of the items in options 2 and 3—the two “renovation options”—as well as the fourth option, a new school. All three renovation options would have replaced the K-wing with a new addition, but the renovated interior of the existing building would have been virtually identical, differing only in the presence or absence of a new cafeteria or gym.
What’s concerning is that a number of committee members seem to have been unaware of the similarities between the renovation options and a new school. And as a result, their public statements were often contradictory or misleading. Committee members interviewed by the Press said the detailed estimates had never been discussed at a committee meeting. Some said that it had always been the committee’s intent to do a thorough interior renovation regardless of which option was chosen, but it’s clear the public hasn’t understood the scope of that renovation.
Does any of this matter? There are plenty of reasons to prefer a new building to a renovated one, and you’ll find many of them spelled out in our letters to the editor this week and in op-eds that have appeared in previous editions. And if option 1 had truly been a bare-bones alternative, as its name implied, and had come with a much lower cost, would it have changed the committee’s vote? More importantly, would Harvard voters have accepted it?
