It's Time to Get Real with Greenacres Elementary School

This is a letter to Scarsdale10583 from Michael Greenberg of Brite Avenue
Along with many others, I attended the Board of Education's meeting on June 20, which included a discussion of the proposals for renovating or reconstructing the Greenacres Elementary School. I support Option B1, which involves renovation and expansion of the existing Greenacres school, rather than demolition of that school and construction of a new school on our existing fields (Option C1).

I would like to make a few points that I hope everyone will consider.

1. The asbestos scare tactics are officially off the table. After the district's architect from KG&D carefully described the process of asbestos abatement in schools (which, by law, takes place ONLY when the school building is empty, during summer months and vacations), and the fact that other construction takes place entirely within sealed areas behind hard, impermeable barriers, with negative pressure, air filtration and frequent air testing, among other precautions, I think it's clear that the scare tactics of the C1 camp concerning exposure to asbestos were never more than that, and that if one or more of that group were really foolish enough to file a lawsuit, as some have threatened, it would be dismissed immediately upon the school board's filing of a motion to dismiss. No such suit that's heavy on fear but devoid of fact would make it past the filing stage. The Board has absolutely nothing to fear in that regard.

2. We should not predetermine this issue. I and many others were extremely disappointed to hear the B1 group's recent email campaign to the Board described dismissively at the June 20th meeting as "robo emails". To the contrary, approximately 270 people took the time recently to write to the board to express their opinion on this issue, many of them with comments specific to their support for option B1, only to have them characterized in this dismissive way. Further, the comment made by Dr. Hagerman at the June 20 meeting that the District is motivated on the B1 v. C1 issue almost exclusively by the "Model Program", and his apparent agreement with KG&D that only C1 satisfies the Model Program, is a real disservice to our community. As was made clear at the June 20 meeting, the Model Program is no more than a prescription for room types and sizes, and the authors of that program offer no evidence that a modern or larger classroom has any bearing at all on educational outcomes. Ask yourselves this. Harvard is the oldest school in America (founded in 1636). It is approaching its 400th birthday. Anyone who has seen Harvard's campus knows that it is filled with old buildings that are far older than Greenacres. If we are to be persuaded by the Model Programmers that big + new = better, then why is it that Harvard so thoughtfully preserves its old buildings and never tears them down? If the Model Programmers are to be believed, then Harvard should be graduating sub-par students. Most of the best universities in America and worldwide (think 1000 year old Oxford or 800 year old Cambridge, and schools like Harvard, Yale, Princeton, Columbia, University of Pennsylvania, Brown, Dartmouth, Williams College, Amherst, etc.) teem with old buildings that have been restored and updated. And yet, these schools are widely regarded as the best schools in the western world. How could that be? If we believe the new + bigger = better crowd, then we have a tremendous paradox on our hands. But the truth is far simpler and less expensive than a new building. Great educational outcomes are the result of engaged children who are encouraged first and foremost to read (something our Xbox generation should consider), and are nurtured in their educations by engaged parents. Successful children also have talented and enthusiastic teachers. They learn the habits of hard work, effective listening and study skills, and the power of organization, time management, high standards and critical thinking. That's it. If you seek a correlation between academic success and some set of factors, look no further than these, because they are the reason that children succeed here. Does anyone truly believe that a primary factor in the success of children in our district is the size of the classroom they study in?

3. And as for Fox Meadow, Heathcote, Quaker Ridge and Edgewood.... As we saw at the June 20 meeting -- since KG&D's April, 2015 feasibility study contains a colorful chart to illustrate the point -- KG&D carefully documented that it is not just Greenacres Elementary that fails to measure up to the Model Program. In fact, every one of our apparently subpar elementary schools fails that test. So when we talk about the $12 million or so of cost difference between B1 and C1, the cost analysis doesn't end there. Once we set the (very questionable) precedent of tearing down schools that don't measure up to a model program that itself is questionable, every neighborhood will now insist that they have their turn. And believe me, the fact that we're tearing down Greenacres "for the children," as I heard repeatedly, who deserve a school that complies fully with the Model Program, will be prominently featured in the debate surrounding any bond issue that includes an option C tear-down option. When that occurs, the Board will be asked to clarify whether only Greenacres needs to be torn down for its failure to comply with the Model Program, and if only Greenacres and not every other elementary school, why that is. To apply this principle consistently, we must conclude that all of Scarsdale's elementary schools must be torn down, since all fail the Model Program. And since we heard from KG&D at the June 20 meeting that it is far more expensive to rebuild a school on its existing footprint than upon a new one, we must conclude that each neighborhood will require a new school on what now serves as their fields. This is where the C1 debate is taking us. When we're cautioned, as we often are at these meetings, that we should consider all facts, I submit that we should look down the road at where the arguments favoring C1 take us. The precedent this sets is unavoidable. If this board wishes to secure any capital project for the next 50 years other than elementary school tear downs and reconstruction, it should consider carefully the implications of the rationale for C1, as documented in KG&D's own presentations.

4. Let the value engineering begin. Value engineering in construction is the substitution of materials and processes that are less expensive than those specified in an itemized budget. Since the cost of C1 exceeds what is likely to pass a bond issue, to make C1 more acceptable will require substantial value engineering. This is a term that architects like to throw around because it sounds "responsible". After all, it has the word "value" in it. But what value engineering will mean here is an increasingly ugly and less functional C1 option, as C1 inevitably is scaled back to more closely resemble the budget of B1. The truth is that we will never again be able to afford to build a building as beautiful and substantial as the one we have now. In fact, that realization -- the fact that construction methods and materials have cheapened over time -- is one of the primary arguments for preservation. "They just don't build them like they used to" is more than a saying. By the time we're done "value engineering" the new school, it will more closely resemble a typical institutional structure than the charming brick and slate-roofed early 20th century school house that we now are so fortunate to have and that too many of us fail to appreciate. Think of the new building at the Five Corners that was vacant for more than a year and that everyone agrees is among the ugliest structures in town. And as for the assumption that new construction outlasts older construction, I am now renovating a 12,000 ft home and carriage house constructed in 1902, alongside new housing that we plan to build. The 1902 home and carriage house were connected in 1978 by an addition that was built to match the original structures' cedar shingle style. Our structural engineering firm just inspected all three structures and sent us a report. Their conclusion: the 1902 home and carriage house are in fine shape and should be preserved. The 1978 addition has degraded and should be torn down. That is a perennial lesson of new vs old construction, where "pre-war" refers to a higher-quality of construction and design that is long gone and "post-war" more often than not is synonymous with undistinguished design and cheap construction methods. Buildings like Greenacres were built at a time when workmanship and beauty mattered more than cost. We have not lived in a world with those values for a very long time. Wasn't that the experience with the Quaker Ridge wing that was built with subpar concrete and did not last even for its projected useful life? According to a NYTimes article which discussed the school in April, 2005:

"In a 2002 inspection of Quaker Ridge, district facilities personnel discovered cracking and deteriorating concrete -- the result of excessive moisture and a bad batch of concrete with beach sand -- on a slab in a crawl space underneath the school. Forty percent was found to have deteriorated, and it is unclear how much more of the space could continue to crack and crumble."

According to the NY Times article, the concrete that failed at Quaker Ridge was poured in 1947 and had failed by 2002. Schools like Greenacres survive far longer than newer buildings because they were overbuilt from the start, before the era when tight budgets and corner-cutting contractors were common. This is why Greenacres and the 200 and 300 year old buildings at some of our nation's best schools still stand. The truth is that we can no longer afford to build a school building of the quality of Greenacres.

5. Even the C1 plan still results in the loss of two baseball fields. As a recent co-president of the Scarsdale Little League, I can tell you that the Little League's spring program, which involves between 850 and 900 Scarsdale children, is perennially short of ball fields, and field conflicts with the town's soccer league are common. Greenacres primary baseball field is one of only two in the town (the other being Hyatt Field on Boulevard) with 90' base paths. The other small field, closer to the playground, is used often as a field for training children to play baseball and for pickup games with kids. The C1 plan contains two soccer fields but zero baseball fields. Since there is nowhere else in town to build a new baseball field, these two fields will be lost forever to the community.

6. Ultimately, it only makes sense if the Town will fund it. I would think that we've all learned, especially from the last bond issue that was defeated, that when you have a budget item that is sufficiently large and unpopular, it will be defeated. The high school fitness center that irked so many people was only a fraction the size of the proposed budget of this school. When the costs are considered, along with the precedent of increasingly out of control spending to fund questionable capital projects, it's obvious to me that a bond issue containing a bloated Option C1 budget will be defeated.

There are now many hundreds of B1 supporters. 830 people signed the B1 petition and only 30 withdrew to sign the C1 petition. After months of concerted effort to get those in Greenacres and elsewhere to sign their petition, the C1 camp is frozen at 156 signatures. That's certainly not for lack of effort. Why would that be if their position is common sense and support for their position broad? The answer is that they are a vocal minority and not at all representative of the majority opinion within Greenacres, and certainly not outside of Greenacres. 156 people are not enough to defeat a bond issue. Hundreds of B1 supporters in Greenacres along with hundreds more in the other neighborhoods of Scarsdale are enough to defeat a bond issue. I hope that B1 is put forth as the Board's choice and that we're not forced to make such a decision.

Our superintendent and Board of Education have done an excellent job with many complicated issues related to our schools, most recently a new teachers' contract. They should be applauded for their tremendous commitment of time and effort on our behalf. I hope that sanity prevails here and that their history of largely excellent work reflecting the will of the community continues.