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01/03/2018 07:00 AMAs the Capital Improvement Program (CIP) Committee plans to present a first version of the program to the public early in the new year, the committee is currently reviewing big-ticket items listed in the plan for the coming year. At the CIP meeting on Dec. 20, the committee discussed the costs listed for Strong Center, with many members asking if this would finally be the end of this project.
The center, which has been in the works for years, is designed to serve as a football field for high school and potentially college games, as well as soccer, lacrosse, and softball. It is also envisioned as a performance arts facility for music, theater, and dance.
Project construction was broken out into two phases. Phase I of the project included the replacement of the former grass football field with an artificial turf field and installation of the scoreboard, flagpoles, lighting, and bleachers with seating for 2,000. Phase II of the project includes a planned plaza and two field houses. The entrance plaza will include a gate; three stone pillars for gold, silver, and bronze sponsor plaques; and 325 engraved granite plaza stones. Additionally the site will include several park benches, a Champions’ Walk from the home field house to the field, and a memorial garden.
Phase II of the project struggled initially because the town was unable to find a contractor to complete the field houses. With the houses now complete, the town recently asked for and received a special appropriation for septic and electric work at the site. Now, close to $230,000 is listed in the CIP for the coming year for additional work at the center.
CIP Chair Mark Casparino said he just wants to know that the number in the CIP reflects the end of the project and that there will be no more requests going forward. Beach & Rec Director Scot Erskine said the number listed will complete the Strong Center work basically from the entrance of the Surf Club all the way into the park and includes things like new fencing, a new bus drop-off loop, and road repairs and improvements. Erskine said the money will also cover some needed improvements, like better lighting.
“The islands in the parking lot are stubbed for lighting, pole lighting, because right now the parking lot doesn’t have anything,” he said. “It’s very dark and as soon as the field lights go out, you are in the dark. We wanted to make the park safer and more appealing, so we are including lighting in the islands.”
Erskine said the plan is also to include a shared-use path through the park for bikers and walkers so that fewer people are walking in the parking lot and a new fence around the field. Erskine said in previous years the town had used snow fencing to enclose the field, but now wants to go with a more permanent solution.
“Then there is going to be a perimeter fence, which is a five-foot-high spectator pedestrian perimeter around Strong Field, so...the high school can take tickets for the football games and other events that they charge admission to,” he said. “It also keeps the kids in the park rather than venturing off.”
CIP member Selectman Scott Murphy said while he’s not looking to place blame, he still doesn’t like the way this project has been handled over the years.
“This project frustrates me because I feel like we don’t have a master plan in order to bring it from years ago to today and I feel like these costs are now being dropped in year one in a five year capital plan and they are sneaking up on us a little bit,” he said. “The whole point of having a five-year capital plan was to prevent this kind of stuff from happening and I don’t want the town to be perceived as the funding mechanism to finish projects that are in private and public partnership…We already did a special appropriation for the septic and the electric maybe a couple of months ago to complete that and now you are adding another $282,000 into year one.”
CIP member Selectman Bruce Wilson said not all of the costs are new and the big number is a product of grouping together several smaller projects.
“There were a bunch of tasks that Scot had put in the plan at the start and, as a result of us wanting to get really high visibility to this project and finishing it, we combined,” he said. “So it is a big number, but it is not all new numbers…This was work that always needed to be done but was never funded. Now we have acknowledged that it needs to be done and we are funding it.”
Regardless of how the number came together, CIP member Bennett Pudlin said this project has grown and changed beyond what was anticipated over the years.
“I think this would be a case study in how we never want to do a project again,” he said.