MONROE, Conn. — First Selectman Terry Rooney attended the Board of Education’s Ad Hoc Facilities Committee meeting Wednesday night to discuss a proposal to reopen Chalk Hill School as part of a districtwide facilities plan to address growing student enrollment and Monroe’s aging school buildings, which are in need of updates.
Luigi Peronace, senior structural engineer with Michael Horton Associates Inc., had submitted a report assessing the condition of Chalk Hill and determined it can be made structurally sound enough to accommodate a third floor. Then the first selectman spoke.
“How many of you have actually built a municipal building?” Rooney asked. “Anyone?”
None of the committee members seated around tables inside the Masuk High School media center raised their hand.
“I know how these things go,” Rooney said of his experience as chairman of the building committee for the Monroe Volunteer Emergency Medical Service project and of overseeing construction of the animal control facility as first selectman.
He told the committee they need to form a building committee with members who are the best fit for the school project. Rooney recommended having an architect, a general contractor and an attorney among the membership.
Rooney also said they need someone to oversee the day-to-day work of the project and collaborate with the building committee.
“We know this is going to take time. Then there will be a referendum,” he said of the need for approval of funding for a multimillion dollar project. “My concern as your first selectman is, what do you need today? People may not agree with me, but this is, even if we start tomorrow, six years in the making based on our charter and how things work here. And if you put it in front of the people of Monroe, will they even support it?”
“Once again, I’m going to give you a fact people don’t like, 2,100 homes in this town use the school system. There are 6,900 homes in this town,” Rooney said, “so there is a large chance that the community will not support this project. And negating that fact is not appropriate. So we have to look at that.”
The first selectman said he supports having a building committee and agreed to help Committee Chairman Jerry Stevens, who also serves on the Board of Education, to form one. After the meeting, Stevens said the committee will put out bids for a pre-construction manager, so more answers can be found on costs.
Student enrollment, housing
The first selectman asked Superintendent Joseph Kobza how consistent the escalation of growth in the student population is from year to year. Rooney said the town saw a Covid bubble.
He said there were reasons why the town shutdown Chalk Hill years ago. Alan Vaglivelo, a longtime school board member, said the reasons were financial.
The conversation turned to new housing that could impact the student population. A committee member asked Rooney about Quarry Ridge, a 99-unit cluster housing community that was approved on Turkey Roost Road.
“Turkey Roost, from the very beginning, and (Community and Economic Development Director) Bill (Holsworth) will say this, when I got into office I told them it will probably never be built,” Rooney said. “You want to know why it will never be built? It is a 60 to 70 million dollar project. We have a gentleman coming in now looking at it for 55 and older. Who’s investing 60 to 70 million on Turkey Roost Road? Do you know how hard that investment is to find?”
“The chances of that getting built is very slim,” Rooney continued. “The chances of that getting built, and I couldn’t wait to say this in front of everybody, is slim to none.”
Stevens asked about Pond View, a mixed-use development with 196 luxury apartments, a club house, pool and other amenities, that was approved to be built at 127 Main St.
Rooney said a state issue is holding that up, but that it may be built at some point.
The first selectman brought up House Bill 8002, which was recently passed by the Connecticut legislature to increase housing in commercial districts. As of July 1, developers will be able to build nine housing units on a commercial lot in Monroe as of right, according to Rooney.
“That’s a problem, because we have a lot of commercial areas on Route 25 where anybody can come in and pop in nine units,” he said. “I can tell you that a large percentage of construction people who look at this stuff say Monroe is probably in the worst shape of most municipalities, because of the lack of commercial interest on Route 25 and 111 for decades.”
The first selectman called the legislation the town’s biggest concern.
Then Rooney brought up 1985, when he said the Stepney section of town “blew up” with housing projects like Northbrook and Blanket Meadow. “I mean, you want to talk about building. What’s happening now is slim compared to what happened back then,” he said. “And still we ended up closing a school.”
Rooney said construction happening now doesn’t give him the big picture that it leads to an “extreme explosion in school enrollment.”
Other options
The first selectman said he does not believe adding onto and reopening Chalk Hill is the best option for Monroe’s school district. “I believe the best path to go, and it’s very hard for people to support it, is to build a new school,” Rooney said.
Rooney mentioned how Bridgeport has an aquaculture school and other towns have agriculture schools and said he asked legislators about a school in Monroe, something “new and exciting,” maybe a technology school.
Stevens said Monroe does not have the available public land to build upon. Previous work by the Ad Hoc Facilities Committee also found state reimbursement for renovated schools is higher than for new construction.
Rooney said it bothers him how much state taxes Monroe pays and how little it gets back and that the state will not pay for a new school for the town.
Steve Kirsch, a committee member who also serves on the Board of Finance in town, recalled a public survey showing backing for reopening Chalk Hill and said he wants to move as quickly as possible on a project. Every year it is delayed, Kirsch said history shows it will be more expensive and there will be less state funding.
If taxpayers think a building project is unnecessary, Kirsch said they will vote it down. “But I’m frustrated with, ‘we got to look at something else,'” he added.
Rooney said he had offered the St. Jude School building earlier in the process, though it was determined it did not meet the standards for a public school, because if he didn’t, the public reaction would have been, “what about that building?”
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