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10/16/2018 12:00 AMAfter months of discussions and negotiations with Our Lady of Mercy Preparatory Academy (OLMPA) for a potential lease of Island Avenue School, residents now have the chance to vote on the final, one-year lease agreement at a Town Meeting on Monday, Oct. 22.
The terms stipulate that the lease will be for one year beginning in August 2019 with no option for a renewal period or extension. The total rent payment is $535,000, payable five days before the building is delivered to OLMPA. OLMPA would be responsible for all maintenance and associated costs in what is known as a triple net lease. The lease document also goes into specific details of the building as well as insurance coverage and indemnification.
At a town meeting, the item is placed up for a vote and if there is not a quorum of 75 residents eligible to vote in attendance, the motion will automatically pass.
The Board of Selectmen (BOS) held a public hearing on Oct. 11 to answer questions and share information about the lease. A small crowd of about 30 residents attended the hearing, mainly OLMPA families or supporters but also a handful of residents with concerns regarding the lease.
First Selectman Tom Banisch said the lease is available on the town website, and has been for a month, for residents to review.
“What we did in calculating that number is we tried to take into account the net present value of the money that we thought we would get if we sold the property,” he said. “We included costs that are going to be hard costs as a result of having to open up the school here in town, which is that we have to pay for busing and we have to pay for a school nurse. We also included in that any taxes that the town might have gotten or been entitled to if this property was developed.”
Some OLMPA supporters said it wasn’t fair to put the cost of a bus into the rental agreement as the town had paid for busing to the former OLM on Neck Road for decades. Banisch said while the town had paid for years, that sum was taken out of the town budget when OLM closed, and will have to be added back in if OLMPA stays in Madison. The busing cost is roughly $130,000.
“Part of the deal when we were discussing a potential lease with them was to say while we want to try to help you and while we want to try to work something out with you, our first concern is the taxpayer of Madison,” Banisch said. “That’s why we need to build back in those things that we wouldn’t otherwise have.”
Residents asked if the language in the lease regarding the one-year is ironclad. Banisch said yes, and with no possibility for renewal. In addition, he said the BOS will start drafting a request for proposal (RFP) for Island Avenue uses either after the one-year lease or after the Madison Public Schools closes the building if the lease is not approved, so that the town will have a plan for the building and not let it sit vacant.
“The question is sooner or later,” he said. “If we do the lease for a year, that is going to push that off for a year, but in the meantime what we want to do is pave the way for that so we are ready to go once the school is available.”
Some questioned if OLMPA could attempt to purchase the school after the lease is up, a possibility that seemed to concern some residents hoping to see the building produce some kind of tax revenue. Banisch said hypothetically yes, but it all depends on what direction the town want to go regarding the future use of Island building or land.
“What I would like to do is get a sense from the town on what they would like to see there,” he said. “…We put the property up for sale and then we entertain offers from people with the idea that it would be developed. Now people have said, ‘Couldn’t the people from OLMPA also bid on the property?’ I would say in the scheme of things they probably can unless we write an RFP that says specifically that we want it developed for something else. That hasn’t been decided and we haven’t had that conversation yet as a BOS, but that’s what could be on the table.”
Banisch also made it clear that while people had a lot of questions about the future of the building several years out, the only question residents will be asked to answer on Oct. 22 is if the town should lease the Island Avenue Elementary School building to OLMPA for one year.
What About the Kids?
OLMPA is currently occupying two buildings this school year, one in Guilford for grades 4 to 8 and a building in North Madison on Old Toll Road for grades pre-K to 3. OLMPA’s John Picard said total enrollment for the school is currently about 60, but noted that new families come to tour the school constantly. OLMPA currently owns the North Madison facility and is leasing the second story of a building in Guilford.
The constant moving of the students first from OLM at Neck Road to this year’s two temporary facilities, possibly to Island next year, and then on to another place was a point of concern for resident Barbara Kelley.
“I have no problem with a one-year lease, but I do have some questions as an educator,” she said. “I don’t understand if you already have a location that the children are at, unless you are being forced out of that location, why you would want to uproot the children once again for another year and then have to uproot them for another year?”
OLMPA supporter Rosemary Hofmiller of Guilford said moving to Island, even if only for a year, is important to get all of the students under one roof again.
“Please entertain us for this building and hopefully maybe someday we will be able to purchase it,” she said. “That would be my dream personally to be able to stay here for the children.”
Picard mentioned that having Island for one year also buys the school some time to establish a permanent home, possibly up at the Old Toll Road facility.
“We own Old Toll Road, so one year many not be enough time to expand and do those sorts of things, but a couple years buys us more time so we have this year and next year,” he said. “We are going to plan for the future of OLMPA staying here in Madison, because the greatest chance for a Catholic school is in the Madison-Guilford area. This just gives us more time to plan on Old Toll Road or something like that. There are two-plus acres there and potentially a little more land.”
Ultimately most of the audience seemed comfortable with the concept of a one-year lease, but one or two vocal residents made it clear they wanted to see an end to Island Avenue as soon as the Madison Public School vacates the building in the summer of 2019.
“Why do we need to get Island Avenue involved?” asked Earl Carta. “Close it and give us the tax money. It comes down to that: tax producing property…Close the school, it’s falling apart anyway. I started teaching there over 50 years ago and I don’t think it has changed since. Tear it down. I’ve talked to real estate agents and they would be delighted to have that property.”
Getting to This Point
Parents and families from OLMPA first came before the BOS on April 9 to discuss the potential of leasing Island Avenue School. Closing Island is part of the Board of Education (BOE) response to declining enrollment; as of now the plan is to close the school in June 2019.
Our Lady of Mercy School (OLM), located at 149 Neck Road, is the main Catholic K to 8 school serving Madison and Guilford since 1954. Early this year the school announced that the school building would close at the end of this academic year and the school would be combined with St. Mary’s School in Branford.
Following the news of the imminent closure, some OLM families banded together to begin looking for ways to separate the school from the local parishes to form an independent school grounded in the Catholic faith, and find a permanent home, ideally still in Madison.
As part of its schools consolidation plan, Madison had earlier announced it would close the Island Avenue School after the 2018-’19 school year. Selectmen and members of OLMPA had been reviewing financial statements and issues like liability to see if leasing Island was a viable option after the Madison Public School District formally turns the building over to the town in 2019.
In July, the BOS expressed concern over some of OLMPA’s finances and was reluctant to move forward to the public with a potential three-year lease agreement. Instead, the BOS opted to continue discussions with a one-year lease option on the table. Selectmen pulled together a rough list of terms and conditions it would want to see in a lease agreement, which then led to Aug. 2 meeting at which the Board of Finance was included in the discussion to offer input.
The town meeting is Monday, Oct. 22 at 6:30 p.m. at Polson Middle School. Residents can find the lease on the town website, www.madisonct.org.