The line for voters to check in at Town Meeting stretched down the hall and toward the Longmeadow High School pool.
Reminder Publishing photo by Sarah Heinonen
LONGMEADOW — With a vote of 1,374-402, residents in Longmeadow chose to fund a $151.59 million combined middle school on the existing Williams Middle School campus. The project, more than a decade in the making, became controversial in 2024, when abutters to the site at 410 Williams St. opposed the location. The next step in the process is a townwide vote on a ballot question to approve the debt exclusion for the project on Sept. 30.
About 1,800 voters, many who attended with their children, packed into Longmeadow High School to weigh in on whether to fund the middle school project. Preparations had been made to accommodate the larger than usual crowd, with a dozen stations for voters to check in, doors opening two hours early and childcare options. Once the gymnasium reached capacity, voters were guided into the auditorium, and then the cafeteria, all connected via audio and video and with assistant moderators to help facilitate questions and comments about the school project.
Set in the geographical center of the town, Williams Middle School was built in 1959 as part of an explosion of school construction nationwide needed to accommodate the post-World War II baby boom. Nine years later, a second school was needed, and Glenbrook Middle School was built. During the 57 years since then, conditions in the buildings have deteriorated, while the academic and security needs of the school community have changed.
In 2007, the town first began exploring solutions for its middle schools. After Longmeadow High School was renovated in 2013, the town once again turned its focus to the middle schools and applied to participate in the Massachusetts School Building Authority’s program. The MSBA, funded through the state sales tax, reimburses municipalities for a portion of eligible costs associated with the renovation or construction of school buildings. In 2022, the town was accepted into the program and voters approved a feasibility study.
While the feasibility study looked at options for renovating or building new construction for both Williams and Glenbrook, the MSBA would only fund one school project, and Glenbrook was decided to be the one in greatest need. However, the agency did allow for a combined middle school as a solution. The cost of new construction was also found to be slightly less expensive than the $159.27 million it would cost to repair both middle schools and bring them up to code, without any improvements.
Bill DiGiulio questioned the cost estimates, which he said were not in line with the averages listed on the MSBA’s website. Middle School Building Committee Chair Armand Wray said the committee’s estimates are based on the analysis of more than a dozen sites around town and the expertise of project management firm Colliers and Jones Whitsett Architects.
The MSBA has agreed to reimburse the town for $54.8 million of the project, leaving taxpayers to fund $96.8 million. By utilizing a debt exclusion, taxpayers would pay the cost of the debt service for the life of the bond, without it permanently increasing the levy limit. Town Manager Lyn Simmons said the average property owner would pay an additional $247 per $100,000 in value. The median home value in Longmeadow is $596,300, meaning the tax bill would increase by $1,462 in the first year of the bond, but that amount would decrease over time.
The Finance Committee, the Select Board and the School Committee each unanimously recommended the project. Finance Committee Chair Erica Weida said she was “confident” that the project was “financially optimal” for the town.
Curt Freedman addressed voters on behalf of Save Our Middle Schools, the group of residents opposed to the project. It was organized in 2024, with members contending that the combined school should be built on a site other than Williams Street and questioning the financial wisdom of the project. After a citizens’ petition article from the group failed at the 2024 fall Town Meeting, the group rebranded and began arguing that closing Glenbrook would be a disservice to the neighborhood.
Freedman asserted that property values in the Glenbrook neighborhood would decrease if the school were shuttered. He said the 16-acre property at 410 Williams St. was too small to house a school for 665 students and only one athletic field would be available at the school.
Further, he said the project’s traffic study was invalid because its data was collected in fair weather. He said there were more traffic accidents at the intersections near the Williams Street site than elsewhere in town and not enough sidewalks on major thoroughfares for children to walk to school. Another Save Our Schools member, Theresa DiGiulio, said people in the Glenbrook neighborhood purchased homes there expecting their children would be able to walk to middle school. She also said children are obese, in part, because they do not walk to school.
Superintendent M. Martin O’Shea said traffic and safety have been built into the design for the combined school. A traffic signal would be installed at the east driveway of the site and a turn lane would relieve congestion along Williams Street. The driveway would allow more than 100 cars to queue for student drop-off and pick-up, without the line backing up onto the street. Meanwhile, a sidewalk on Williams Street and a raised crosswalk with a lighted beacon would make walking to school safer than it is currently. The location maximizes the number of students that can travel to the school on foot or by bike, he said.
School Committee member Nicole Choiniere emphasized that a vote against the middle school project was not a vote for renovating the existing middle schools. Instead, she said, the process with the MSBA would end. The town would then have to fund repair work for the schools while it waited several years to be accepted back into the MSBA’s program. Even then, she said MSBA would only fund one of the two middle schools and renovating one school over the other would be unfair.
The first voter to speak during the discussion, Robert Barkett, proposed an amendment to the motion. The town’s Home Rule Charter includes a provision that a vote at Town Meeting can be challenged by a referendum, provided 3% of voters file a petition within five days. However, the charter also allows exceptions to this, including if there is an “emergency measure necessary for the immediate preservation of the peace, health, safety or convenience of the town.” Barkett’s amendment invoked this exception based on the urgency associated with the MSBA’s rigid timeline and concerns that a challenge may have endangered the funding. The provision was also used when Town Meeting voted on funding construction of the high school. Townsend clarified that the amendment would not eliminate the need for approval of the debt exclusion at the ballot box on Sept. 30.
Michael Kallock, a member of the Save Our Middle Schools group, said the amendment was confusing to voters. Mark Gold stated that the ability to challenge a Town Meeting vote exists because some voters are unable to attend the meeting and it gives them the ability to voice their opinion on matters.
“We all showed up tonight,” said Cameron Burke, a member of the SMART Longmeadow group in favor of the school project. “We should have our voices heard.” Voters approved the amendment 1,336-426, meeting the requirement that two-thirds of voters approve the amendment.
More than half a dozen people spoke both for and against the project. One resident said he felt voters were being “rushed” to choose the combined school and that options for renovating the two existing schools had not been fully explored.
On the other side of the issue was a voter who said he knew firsthand about subpar conditions as he had attended a federal military service academy with a faulty HVAC system, leaking roofs and condemned buildings. “You must act now and give the future of Longmeadow a quality educational opportunity,” he said.
Bill DiGiulio asked what the plan was for the Glenbrook site. He specifically asked if it was likely that it would be developed into affordable housing, a claim he and Save Our Middle Schools had made in recent weeks. Simmons said it is “premature to speculate” about future uses of the Glenbrook site, which is owned by the town, as it is still a school and will be for the next three years while construction of the new school is underway. When the time comes to decide on a future use, she assured him that it would include a “robust public process.”
