As the high school building project nears a crucial submission deadline for reimbursement funding, officials are underscoring the necessity of the renovation and addition. The stakes are high, with an estimated nearly $100 million in possible cost reimbursement and a new school that will serve Island youth for decades resting on approval.
"It's been a long haul to get to this point ... it's quite an extensive submission," Sally Rizzo, a member of the high school building committee, said. "It has all the elements that we've been talking about for the past two years."
The reimbursement funding will come from the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA), a quasi-state government organization that assists with educational capital projects across the state. The MSBA approved the Martha's Vineyard Regional High School building project in 2022 after local administrators submitted seven failed applications over several years.
The upcoming submission by the school committee to the MSBA board -- the deadline of which is Dec. 18 -- will also include updated costs for the project.
Recent cost estimates for the new high school building are at about $334 million. The MSBA board will vote on the exact reimbursement rate in February. Current estimates put the rate of reimbursement at around $100 million total.
The high school building project has taken nearly a decade to plan. But according to school officials, these next few months are some of the most important in terms of approvals and cost. The building was built in the 1950s, and while it has been renovated a few times since, it has never undergone an extensive remodel.
Over 700 students currently attend the school, and many students, staff, and committee members have pointed to mold, asbestos under the floorboards, leaks, small classroom sizes, and mechanical issues that have plagued the building for years.
The high school has been slated for a renovation and addition because of those noted deficiencies in infrastructure, mechanics, and standards of learning spaces. This was further highlighted by the New England Association of Schools and Colleges (NEASC), the organization responsible for accreditation of the high school.
In a report from last week, NEASC, which issues a globally recognized standard of excellence and an accreditation that school officials said MVRHS is proud of, reported that the school building "does not meet" the educational standards required for continued accreditation.
While NEASC representatives told The Times that the accreditation is not currently at risk, they said it is important that the school focus on fixing the deficiencies in the building.
"We work with the school so that there's progress being made," Alyson Geary, the director of accreditation and school improvement at NEASC, said in an interview. "As long as the schools are making progress towards these goals."
As for the work being done to meet those goals set by the school committee and NEASC, there are some important upcoming dates that will set the stage for the project as a whole. A school building committee meeting on Friday is scheduled to discuss costs, Tuesday the high school committee will review the submission, and next Thursday is the deadline to send the submission packet to MSBA.
The report will include everything the MVRHS building committee has been working on for the past few years. From the site plan and building materials to the cost estimates and designs by Tappé Architects, it will be the most substantial package submitted yet.
The most recent headway made by the school building committee was choosing the construction managers at risk in October: a combination of W.T. Rich and Shawmut, who will work together to nail down costs, and then manage construction.
After submission to the MSBA and official cost estimates are made public, the school committee's primary goal will turn to the public, through education and outreach prior to an Island-wide vote, which is tentatively scheduled for June 2, 2026.
A preview of these educational sessions was seen at a meeting in Aquinnah in early November, when the MVRHS building committee gave residents of the town an update on the project.
Aquinnah residents had a variety of questions, from cost to sourcing local labor, and some of those who were present said it was an extremely productive meeting. But there were also some controversial moments, such as when one resident, Jamie O'Brien, exited the room to loud applause after he made accusatory comments to Superintendent Richie Smith.
"We're trying to get a school project through for our kids. No one's going to stoop to a level where we need our constituents, our Island folks, to come together in support of a project that is everybody's -- and I'll say it again -- everybody's responsibility," Smith responded in the Aquinnah meeting.
O'Brien was especially concerned about the cost to taxpayers for the high school building project, among other things. The cost of the project has been at the forefront of the conversation with residents of each town, as well as the town leaders. A funding formula that was decided on by town representatives years ago has also been contested, mainly by Tisbury officials. A few towns, such as Tisbury and Chilmark, have raised concerns about the cost of the project.
Tisbury is slated to pay one of the highest percentages out of the funding formula. The cost was broken down several years ago so that all six towns are paying amounts based on student enrollment and property taxes. In this formula, Aquinnah pays the least, and the down-Island towns pay higher amounts.
"There's a lot of challenges wrapped up in that capital funding formula," school committee member Kathryn Shertzer said in a meeting last June.
But with the Tisbury school building project on their tax docket and what some say are disproportionate percentages of payment, Tisbury officials have brought up their concerns about cost at multiple school committee meetings. Some have requested a more regionalized, balanced approach to the cost-sharing.
Much of the conversation about cost has revolved around estimates. The Dec. 18 MSBA deadline is important to push the project through but also further nail down the cost of the project that will be absorbed by the Vineyard towns and taxpayers.
"It's quite significant," Rizzo said regarding the submission deadline and report. "I mean, it's been a lot of work by a lot of people to get to this point, and I think we can be very proud of the plan that we have. It makes sense for the educational program and for the future of the Island, because it will be a sustainable building, and it'll hopefully meet the needs of education for the next 50 years."