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10/23/2018 12:00 AMOnce again, against fairly daunting odds, a group of parents recently managed to clear another hurdle to keep a Catholic school in Madison. On Oct. 22, residents overwhelmingly approved a lease between Our Lady of Mercy Preparatory Academy (OLMPA) for Island Avenue School at a town meeting.
At a town meeting, when an 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. However, enough residents did turn out to the town meeting for the registrar to use paper tally sheets for a formal vote count. The final result was 91 votes in favor of the lease and 19 votes against.
OLMPA’s John Picard said he is pleased the school will have a home still in Madison after this academic year.
“This is great news for OLMPA and possibly better news for the town of Madison, which will not have another vacant building that will cost them money,” he said. “They will now receive over half a million dollars in revenue. I would like to thank all of those who voted to support us. We are very excited about OLMPA’s present and future.”
The terms stipulate that the lease will be for one year beginning in August 2019 after Madison Public Schools has vacated the building 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.
To calculate the lease cost, the town took into account the net present value of the property if it had been immediately sold as well as other hard costs like busing and nursing that the state requires municipality’s provide to private schools within a municipality’s borders.
The town pushed out a lot of information regarding the lease before the town meeting and had previously postponed some public hearing so make sure there was enough time to get information out to the residents before a vote.
“We have had public hearings and we have had a lot of information out in the newspapers,” said First Selectman Tom Banisch.
At the public hearing on the lease on Oct. 11, officials and residents had discussed what would happen to the building after OLMPAs one-year lease was up. 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.
Residents had also 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 Board of Selectmen (BOS) would start drafting a request for proposals (RFP) for Island Avenue uses for after the one-year lease so that the town will have a plan for the building and not let it sit vacant.
The History
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.
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.