Monatiquot School Eyed as Kindergarten Center

The School Committee is considering using the Monatiquot School as a kindergarten center starting during the 2014-2015 academic year and will also transfer Eldridge and Foster to the town for sale in the private market.

Committee members voted unanimously Monday night to tell Meeting House Montessori School, which currently leases half of Monatiquot, that the school department will not renew its lease at the end of the next school year. The administration continues to move ahead on its plans for two full-day kindergarten classrooms at the school starting in September.

Opening Monatiquot as a kindergarten center would free up 12 classrooms at Braintree's six elementary schools, alleviating some space concerns but not fully addressing an influx of students that has left classrooms in media centers, cafeterias and other makeshift places.

Those extra classrooms would fill up immediately with children, committee member David Ringius said, and so the town needs to keep working on a long-term solution even as it takes over the former elementary school completely.

"We have space issues and we have to address those," Ringius said.

Committee Chair Shannon Hume, who serves on the School Building Committee along with other members and school administrators, said that the building committee is examining how to move forward – whether by way of new schools, permanent additions or some combination of those and renovations to existing buildings.

By declaring former schools Eldridge and Foster as surplus and handing them back over to the town, the school department is heading toward a long-term plan, Business Manager Peter Kress said. Foster is currently being leased but Eldridge is empty.

It is not in the best interest of the school department to use the buildings based on their annual operations costs, small size and condition, Kress wrote in a letter to Superintendent Dr. Peter Kurzberg.

"The Braintree School Building Committee has reviewed the continued use of these two facilities and has found that it is not economically or educationally advantageous to operate these facilities as schools for the Town of Braintree," Kress wrote.

Foster's value, combining the building, land and yard items, is $2.65 million, according to a profile put together for a five-year capital plan presented to the School Committee in January. Eldridge was listed at $1.16 million.

But in a memo by Chief of Staff and Operations Peter Morin, based on assessor's data, the town valued the combined properties at approximately $10 million, committee member Tom Devin said.

Mayor Joseph Sullivan said that the town will look to the open market for a healthy value on the properties, and that it will be able to manage the sale to protect the interests of the surrounding neighborhoods.

"Eldridge and Foster are properties that have value in terms of the housing market," Sullivan said.

Pam Kiley asked whether it was wise to send the buildings back to the town for it to generate the money rather than the school system.

"Keep in mind, all of our money comes from the town," Hume said.