The playground, sports fields, and landscaping around the new Hildreth Elementary School will be finished in late October, construction manager Jon Seymour told the School Building Committee last week. This week, Seymour said, crews were scheduled to pave the main parking lot, rough-grade the ballfield, and work on retaining walls by the future playground—all dependent on weather, of course. And Solect Energy was installing the solar panels on the new school’s south roof.
As the work nears completion, project manager Tom Murphy reported the budget was in good shape. For months the committee has worried that costly problems might turn up during this phase of the project—perhaps a large batch of contaminated soil or another heap of buried boulders that would have to be removed. But Murphy said those risks are mostly past, and any problems have been settled within the budget. Overall, he said, about $500,000 has been saved in the construction budget.
In a later email SusanMary Redinger, who chairs both the building committee and the School Committee, wrote,
“[A]t this point we are projecting about $800,000 in unspent funds, provided there are no further unforeseen conditions.” If that prediction holds, the town may not need to borrow as much as the 2018 Town Meeting initially authorized. Finance Director Jared Mullane told the Press about $3.5 million has not yet been borrowed, and that amount could be reduced.
Maintenance is a concern
Building committee member Rick Maiore asked how the new grass and landscape plantings would be watered, given Harvard’s ban on outdoor watering in the town center. Seymour explained water is being trucked in from outside town.
Maiore, who is also a member of the Permanent Building Committee, said that committee is “very concerned” about the need for a maintenance program for the new school. He said the committee would like to see a maintenance schedule as well as the warranties on all equipment and systems. Murphy replied that each contractor for the new building is responsible for providing maintenance manuals to Pat Harrigan, the school facilities director. School Superintendent Linda Dwight said Harrigan tracks the maintenance program using software that the Permanent Building Committee can access.
Dwight asked the School Building Committee to approve buying a large mower and a snowblower so Harrigan’s staff could mow grass and clear sidewalks around both schools without needing to rely on the Department of Public Works. But committee member Marie Sobalvarro, who is assistant town administrator, objected to considering the request, as it had not been included in the meeting packet. So the committee postponed the topic until its next meeting.
