CT Construction Digest Thursday March 11, 2021
Seven firms interested in designing Norwich school renovation, consolidation project
Claire Bessette Norwich — Seven architectural firms submitted their qualifications Wednesday expressing interest in designing a planned major restructuring of city schools, including renovations and consolidations involving all school buildings and administrative offices.
The plan eventually will be presented to voters in a referendum.
Six Connecticut firms responded to the request for qualifications Wednesday, including JCJ Architects of Hartford, part of a partnership of three firms that designed a $144 million Norwich schools restructuring plan in 2016 that was rejected by the City Council. But that plan was used extensively by a school facilities review committee that put together a recommended renovation/consolidation plan in August 2019.
In addition to JCJ, Tecton Architects of Hartford, Silver/Petrucelli+Associates of Hamden, MGT Consulting of Tampa, Fla., Friar Architecture of Farmington, Drummey Rosane Anderson of South Windsor and Antinozzi Associates of Bridgeport submitted information to the city.
City Council President Pro Tempore Mark Bettencourt, chairman of the School Building Committee established by the council, said he is pleased with the submissions. The committee will review the applicants and rate them based on the selection criteria, which includes experience with school district redesigning, success in winning voter approval and state funding for projects and management of projects through construction.
Once finalists are identified, the committee will ask for cost estimates and schedules for coming up with a school renovation/consolidation plan for Norwich.
“Most of the companies were in-state, which is good,” Bettencourt said. “It looks like we’ll have some quality choices.”
He said there is no time schedule for finalizing a consolidation plan. “We want it as soon as possible but don’t want to sacrifice quality. And we want to make sure it’s something voters can support at a referendum.”
The plan approved by the School Facilities Review Committee in 2019 proposed renovating as new the John B. Stanton, John Moriarty and Uncas elementary schools and building a fourth new elementary school for 300 to 600 students, preferably in the East Side area. All would house preschool through fifth grade.
The Teachers’ Memorial Middle School would be renovated as new for sixth through eighth grades, while the recently renovated Kelly Middle School would remain a school for sixth through eighth grades.
The Samuel Huntington School would close as an elementary school and house consolidated administrative offices and the Norwich Transition Academy, a vocational program for special education students aged 18 to 21. The transition academy plans to move to a current preschool building on Case Street this summer. That building would be sold in the consolidation plan.
The Thomas Mahan Elementary School would close and be listed for sale. The building, located off Route 82 in the city’s prime commercial district, is considered valuable for commercial development. The central office building, the historic 1895 former John Mason School at the Norwichtown Green and the Hickory Street building also would be closed and listed for sale.
Wequonnoc School in Taftville would close as an elementary school, with the arts and technology magnet school program moving to the to-be-renovated Moriarty environmental magnet school building. Wequonnoc would be renovated to house Adult Education.
The status of the Veterans’ elementary school remains in question in the proposal, contingent on student population projections.
Route 154 detour in Old Saybrook in place for bridge replacement project
Old Saybrook — The Connecticut Department of Transportation said in a news release that a closure and detour of Route 154 in Old Saybrook is slated to be in place from March 8 to May 31 due to construction to replace the bridge carrying Route 154 over Plum Bank Creek.
DOT has released the following detour information:
Access to the south side of the bridge from the north:
• "Continue North of the bridge on Route 154 for 1.1 miles. Turn right onto Old Boston Post Road and travel for 0.7 miles to Main Street. Turn right onto Main Street and travel for 0.5 miles to Maple Avenue. Turn right onto Maple Avenue and continue for 1.3 miles until Route 154 is reached. Turn right onto Route 154 and follow for 0.9 miles bringing traffic to the North side of the structure."
Access to the north side of the bridge from the south:
• "Continue South of the bridge on Route 154 for 0.9 miles. Turn left onto Maple Avenue and continue 1.3 miles. Turn left onto Main Street and continue 0.5 miles. Turn left onto Old Boston Post Road and continue for 0.7 miles. Turn left again onto Route 154 and follow for 1.1 miles bringing traffic to the North side of the structure."
The bridge project, which was awarded to Arborio Corporation for $2.15 million, is slated to be completed July 30, according to the news release.
"During this construction season, the existing bridge will be reconstructed utilizing precast substructure elements founded on piles, with prestressed concrete deck units to form the bridge deck," the release stated. "Cast-in-place closure pours and parapets will complete the new structure. The overhead utilities that were relocated last season will be permanently relocated after the new bridge is constructed. In addition, a new 12-inch watermain will be installed."
Plainfield Amazon distribution center plan clears P&Z
John Penney PLAINFIELD – The Planning and Zoning Commission on Tuesday unanimously approved a site plan for a planned Amazon distribution facility after lingering questions concerning sidewalks, traffic and sight lines were addressed.
The commission’s vote marked the last major town-level hurdle for the project and clears the way for permitting and eventual construction by BL Companies for the Exeter Group, the project's applicant, on a section of the former dog-racing track at 137 Lathrop Road.
First Selectman Kevin Cunningham said he plans to reach out to project principals soon to discuss a range of issues related to the project, including support and hiring.
“I’m estimating they’ll need up to 600 people, from sorters to drivers to managers and these are jobs that start out at $15 an hour,” he said. “In addition, we’re looking at indirect economic benefits to our restaurants, supermarkets and gas stations. And when you have a company like Amazon coming in, you typically see other companies following. We’ve already seen some of that with a buying boom reported by realtors.”
Plans call for the building of a main warehouse with 664 parking spaces where incoming fleets of package-laden trucks will enter overnight and loaded outgoing delivery vans will leave hours later as part of Amazon's “last mile” system.
Matthew Robillard, a project manager for BL, said his group worked “extensively” with town officials in the last few weeks to address several concerns brought up during the commission’s February meeting.
Robillard said a 5-foot wide sidewalk will be added on Lathrop Road from the Amazon site to the nearby shopping plaza that houses the Big Y supermarket and other businesses. He said vegetation clearing is also planned for the site.
“There will be plenty of sight lines for vehicles to safely enter and exit the property,” he said.
Project representatives, which included those from Amazon, Exeter and BL, also addressed potential traffic issues by agreeing to return to the commission if peak traffic hours change. Mike Dion, a BL engineer, said the bulk of the facility’s vehicles will head out for deliveries between 9:30-10:30 a.m. to avoid the main hours of commuter traffic from 7-9 a.m.
Amazon representatives warned that traffic patterns will change during the company’s peak delivery season of mid-November to early January to accommodate increased customer orders.
The former Greyhound dog-racing park opened in 1976, rapidly becoming one of the most profitable tracks in the nation, pulling in gamblers from across the state and beyond. Competition from the region’s two Indian-owned casinos in the 1990s, however, proved too much for the park.
The race track closed in May 2005 and the property was bought the next year for $7.5 million by the BVS company, a subsidiary of the Fairfield-based Starwood Cerruzi firm.
The Ceruzzi purchase ended previous plans for a 140,000-seat domed racetrack, floated by Trumbull-based developer Gene Arganese.
In June 2006, Arganese sued the town after the Planning and Zoning Commission reversed its decision to create a resort-recreation zone on the property. The zone change would have accommodated Arganese’s planned $400 million NASCAR-style domed racetrack on adjacent dog track property.
Winstanley Enterprises, a Concord, Massachusetts, investment and development company that serves as landlord for several office spaces and warehouses in New England, bought the track in November 2017 from BVS Plainfield Investors LLC for $3.37 million.
Lamont’s budget would borrow nearly $220 million — to pay off borrowing
Keith M. Phaneuf During his first two years on the job, Gov. Ned Lamont rarely passed up an opportunity to decry Connecticut’s excessive borrowing while pitching a “debt diet” for state government.
Yet the first budget Lamont signed delayed a plan to wean state government off a practice that many fiscal purists find disturbing: effectively borrowing more than $100 million annually to pay off other borrowing.
And now, the Democratic governor wants to abandon that reform effort entirely.
“As a Republican leader that cares about fiscal responsibility, I’m still searching for common ground with this governor,” said House Minority Leader Vincent J. Candelora, R-North Branford, who warned the governor’s proposal could jeopardize Connecticut’s reputation on Wall Street. “This reversal, I think, is not only bad for our [credit] rating agency outlooks, but it encourages that bad behavior that we’ve seen out of legislators.”
Changing how CT uses proceeds from bond premiums
At issue are “bond premiums” — a tool that states use to market the bonds they issue on Wall Street to borrow money for capital projects. More specifically, the question is how Connecticut should use the proceeds from these premiums.
Investors sometimes want a bond that pays a higher rate than the state is offering, which they then can trade on a secondary securities market. To get that higher rate, investors offer a premium — extra dollars, above what a state wants to borrow — that matches the added interest costs.
In theory, it’s a wash for states — accepting the premium costs them nothing, if they add it to the funds already earmarked to retire debt. The higher rates simply make the bonds more attractive to investors.
States also could come out ahead by using these premiums to pay cash for future capital projects, thereby avoiding the addition of more debt to the books.But Connecticut does neither of these things.
Instead, it uses these borrowed dollars to reduce the amount of state money it must spend to cover its minimum required debt payments each year. Effectively, the premiums are used to control the growth in the debt service account — using borrowed dollars — thereby freeing up more money to spend elsewhere in the budget.
Using one credit card to pay off another
And over time, Connecticut’s reliance on this practice— which critics liken to using one credit card to pay off another — has grown.
From the 2005 through 2010 fiscal years, the state took, on average, $36 million per year in premiums, according to records from the treasurer’s office.
In the first four fiscal years of the Malloy administration, from 2012 through 2015, premiums averaged almost $87 million.
By Malloy’s second term, things exploded.
In 2015, state Treasurer Denise L. Nappier also expressed fears Connecticut’s reputation on Wall Street was in jeopardy when Malloy proposed a two-year budget that relied on an average of more than $160 million per year in annual borrowing to help cover debt costs.
The demand for premiums is driven by the market, not by the state budget situation. And the treasurer cannot control how the governor and legislature use these premiums. But Nappier, who was treasurer from 2005 through 2018, challenged officials frequently to reform the budgeting process, arguing that when demand for premiums is high, it’s vital that Connecticut use the proceeds responsibly.
During Lamont’s first full fiscal year in office, 2019-20, the state used $125.7 million in bond premiums to support the budget, according to the treasurer’s office. And another $117.8 million is projected to go for that purpose this fiscal year.
Lamont’s latest biennial budget proposal also relies on using $218.2 million in borrowed dollars — or slightly more than $109 million per year — to make the minimum payments on borrowing, according to the treasurer’s office.
“What about his debt diet?” asked Senate Minority Leader Kevin Kelly, R-Stratford.
With about $27 billion in bonded indebtedness, Connecticut is one of the most indebted states, per capita, in the nation.
“In what world is borrowing to pay off your borrowing debt a smart decision?” Kelly said. “It’s not how middle-class families balance their household budgets. Yet it is the middle-class who suffer most when government engages in these dangerous financial practices.”
Lamont’s deputy budget director, Kosta Diamantis, urged officials to consider the current context, which includes a coronavirus-induced economic downturn, low interest rates and significant projected budget deficits.
Analysts warned in February that state finances, unless adjusted, would run about $2.6 billion in deficit over the next two fiscal years combined.
Maintaining the current system “would preserve General Fund resources in the present, thereby helping close our budget gap and avoid taking steps such as tax increases or additional cuts to services,” Diamantis added.
But Connecticut has more than $3 billion in its emergency budget reserve, commonly known as the rainy day fund. And state officials also are projecting the state will receive close to $2.7 billion in new federal aid that can be used to help balance the next state budget, based on the relief package recently enacted by Congress.
And it’s not just Republicans who say it’s too soon for Connecticut to abandon the borrowing reform effort.
The current state treasurer, Shawn T. Wooden — like Nappier, a Hartford Democrat — also said Tuesday that Connecticut should not repeal this initiative.
But Wooden added that if Lamont and lawmakers decide it’s in the best interest to defer this reform — given the economic challenges of the pandemic — “I would support a delay in the implementation of this provision for two more years to put Connecticut in the best fiscal position during this economic recovery period.”
Sen. John Fonfara, D-Hartford, co-chair of the Finance, Revenue and Bonding Committee, also said Connecticut shouldn’t stop trying to abandon this practice.
The bipartisan budget enacted four years ago included many fiscal reforms, including new spending and borrowing caps, two programs to force greater budget savings — and an end to using bond premiums to support the state budget starting in 2019.
The first budget Lamont signed, in June 2019, delayed that reform effort for two years. His second budget recommends canceling it entirely.
“Spending volatile revenue is one of the more obvious issues that needed to be addressed” in 2017, Fonfara said, “but there are other, less obvious ways in which we’re not budgeting honestly that is costing the taxpayers of the state much more than we need to.”
Upgrades improve Waterbury train station; among key city projects
Andrew Larson WATERBURY – The newly redesigned parking lot at the Waterbury Train Station, which opened last spring, is one of many upgrades to the Meadow Street area during 2020.
The project involved reconfiguring and repaving the parking lot, installing new drainage and lighting, and adding landscaping. A bus pick-up and drop-off zone and passenger waiting shelter were built.
During the first phase, which began in 2014, the abandoned SNET building at 333 Meadow St. was removed. The building was often blamed for blocking the train station parking lot from Meadow Street, contributing to a rash of vehicle break-ins.
Reports of break-ins to vehicles parked in the lot have become almost non-existent since the building was razed. Also, security cameras have been installed.
The demolition cost about $1.5 million, which was funded by the state Department of Transportation. The site improvements cost about $700,000, with funds provided by the state and Federal Transit Administration.
The upgrades were overseen by the Waterbury Development Corp.
In 2018, the city’s plan to renovate the old baggage room of the Republican-American building to create an indoor waiting area was scrapped after it learned grant money allocated for the project could only be used for parking lot improvements.
The building at 333 Meadow St. opened in 1973 and was built for Southern New England Telephone Co.’s 411 call center and customer service station. It had been vacant since 1993, when the center closed, except for a brief period in 2007 when Metropolitan Transit Police used it as a K-9 training facility.
The area has been a focus of the city’s economic development efforts. The extension of Jackson Street, which runs from Bank Street to West Main Street, was completed last year. Also, part of the former Anaconda American Brass Co. factory on Freight Street has been demolished.