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NORTHBRIDGE, Mass. – The total cost to purchase property and a building on Douglas Road and renovate the building into a functional Department of Public Works facility will be about $3 million, the Northbridge Finance Committee was told at a meeting Tuesday.
Town Manager Theodore Kozak said he recommends asking voters at the Oct. 23 fall annual town meeting to borrow $995,000 to purchase the land and building. Renovation costs could be sought at a special town meeting early next year or at the spring annual town meeting in May 2013, he said.
The two-step funding plan met with criticism from resident Shelly Buma, who said voters shouldn’t be asked to purchase the property until the town has gone out for bids and has firm renovation costs.
“It needs to be a package deal,” Buma said.
Cost estimates presented Tuesday came from a professional estimator with HKT Architects, the firm that conducted a feasibility study on whether the DPW could stay at its current Fletcher Street location.
Though the study showed the Fletcher Street property could be used, officials considered the $8 million cost to build a new facility there too high and sought other options.
The new plan keeps snow and ice removal at the Fletcher Street site, and the cost estimate includes about $100,000 in improvements there.
Buma also pointed out to Finance Committee Chairman Salvatore D’Amato that supporting the property purchase before receiving renovation bids is in direct contrast to policy he has insisted be followed on other projects.
D’Amato agreed it’s a “flawed process’’ but said that delaying the land purchase until receiving renovation bids would put the town at risk of losing the property.
“We’re coming to the end, I hope, of a 17-year process,’’ D’Amato said. His committee won’t vote on whether to support the purchase until Oct. 11, after the Building, Planning and Construction Committee, which meets Thursday, has weighed in on the plan.
Kozak said the $3 million project would cost the average homeowner about $23 per year. With the property off the tax rolls, the town would lose about $11,000 per year in tax revenue.
The Finance Committee voted not to support a second town meeting article related to the Department of Public Works, one petitioned and seeking $1.8 million to build a DPW facility on town-owned land on Providence Road.
Comments (14)
Funny how D'Amato is so hot and cold with his policies and procedures
The night the "Mitchell Team" defended our proposal before the Finance Committee we were assured that the committee would not vote until they had the recommendation of the BPCC on which proposal they supported.
Mr. D'Amato was adamant about this point when I sought assurance that they would not vote at the meeting we were at. He assured those present, more than once, that a vote would be taken after the BPCC had given their recommendation.
I was not at this meeting that the finance committee voted to not support our article so I take it the BPCC has taken a vote not to support our proposal although there is no mention of it in the article.
Was anyone at this meeting who can verify that the BPCC has recommended to the Finance Committee that they do not support the article the “Mitchell Team” has on the warrant?
Certainly, Mr. D’Amato would not go back on his statement?
I hope he didn’t use the “professional cost estimate” excuse as we, a team of professionals, furnished the BPCC and the Finance Committee with our estimates based, for the most part, on actual bids.
One correction of what has appeared at least twice recently in the Daily Voice and that is the “Mitchell Team” design for 1.8 million dollars can be built at either the WWTP site or the Fletcher Street site. Fletcher street has been missing in the previous articles.
When one may do a suggestive actuary study of the possible life of 60 years of this facility, the total potential costs may be approx higher then $3 Million Dollars to the potential Taxpayers.
Plus good points Mr. Davis I wonder who may oversee, the FINCOM and the BPCC?
Did the FinCom give a reason for not supporting the $1.8 million dollar proposal from the Concerned Citizen group. They have stamped plans, legitimate estimates backed by real bids they should deserve a seat at the table with the other options? If we leave politics aside if any proposal can be backed up with legitimate cost estimates they deserve the support of the FinCom and or at least the right to be voted on.
I too agree on letting the tax payers vote on the Fletcher St. ($8 million) project, without any negative feedback from our elected officials. But the hard cold truth is the elders and yuppies of this town just want to keep their money for themselves and forget about helping the hard working employyes who they expect to be there in a moments notice! Give me a ballot now i'll vote yes, and double yes on the $8 million Fletcher St. site
I am with you and I believe that there are qute a few others out there too.
As for the school being paid off early thanks to the State, what's happened to all of the available funds? Are we going to see a decrease in our real estate taxes or is the Town Manager going to spend it on other things. With the turf at the High School being defeated, where is that available money going? It's about time that this town be micro-managed on spending and work being done! With all of the money allocated for special surveys, we could have had a new DPW!
There is no "available money". The town had a choice- use some of the money for a turf field or take a small reduction in taxes. The voters opted for smaller taxes. Any new projects require new funding and a commensurate tax increase.
The town already spent $76k on the feasibility study for the Fletcher St property. Why not put that on the town ballot and let the residents of the town actually vote on the project before killing it.
The article references the $3mil price tag for the property on douglas road, but it does not mention how much tax revenue will be lost over the useful life of the property.
I for one, would vote for the new Fletcher St. site. We are talking roughly $.37 a day. Taxes already went down when the school was paid off. Why not let the residents have a say instead of just saying no?
Actually, the article quotes the TM (second to last paragraph) of $11K/year in lost taxes.
The article reference $11,000 per year. This is not an actual value. the value will go up in the future, there fore increasing the lost taxes over the useful life.
Exactly. It's 11k per year now but what will it be 5 ,10, 20, 30......... years from now. If the building has a 50 year life span it would be well within the realm of possibility that the Town stands to potentially loose between 1 to 1.5 million in lost future revenue just in RE taxes.
It's not like Northbridge has an abundency of commercial properties available why take one off of the tax rolls. Besides loosing the RE taxes the Town stands to loose revenue from lost water & sewer rates, as well as excise tax from vehicles that would be associated with the business in that location. It also stands to loose on future personal property taxes that any business that would have been there would have been subject to pay on all of it's belongings etc.. The loss of potential revenues for a site like that is in all likeliehood easily above $2 million.
Even if the sites are only 3/4 of a mile apart you still have the iefficiency of one operation operating out of two locations. You also have done nothing to address floodplain issues or future remediation issues.
You combine all of that and the cost will be in the vicinity of the $8 million dollar proposal that is currently out there.
Like I said before this will never happen. So lets stop getting everyones hopes up.