Resident Pursues Referendum for ‘Lower Cost Proposal’ at Saxe Middle School

A New Canaan man is on the verge of kickstarting a process which, if ultimately successful through its several steps, would see the recently approved $18.6 million appropriation for the Saxe Middle School building project kicked back to the Board of Finance for “reconsideration and a recommendation of a lower cost proposal.”

Michael Nowacki said he has garnered 41 of the required 50 signatures needed to file a notice of intent to petition for referendum—the very first step in a process outlined in chapters 4-15 and 4-16 of the Town Charter.

Nowacki, known to many in New Canaan as a petitioning candidate for first selectman this local election season just past, said he “absolutely” expects to get the signatures he needs by a deadline this Thursday.

“There is no question about whether we will get there or not,” Nowacki said.

In order to force an actual referendum vote, Nowacki would need within 30 days of the public notice of the appropriation (which officially was last Thursday, Dec. 3) to have 5 percent of the electorate on the last completed registry list—that amounts to some 600-plus people, according to Town Clerk Claudia Weber—sign a petition for referendum which includes the following language (approved by the town attorney):

“We the undersigned electors of the Town of New Canaan, acting pursuant to Section C4-16 of the New Canaan Town Charter, hereby petition for a referendum regarding the action taken by the Town Council on November 30, 2015 to resolve the following question:

‘SHALL the action taken by the Town Council at its meeting on November 30, 2015, which approved the ‘Resolution Authorizing an Appropriation of $18,600,000 for Additions and Renovations to Portions of the Saxe Middle School and The Financing of Said Appropriation by the Issuance of General Obligation Bonds Of the Town And Notes in Anticipation Of Such Bonds in the Amount Not To Exceed $18,600,000’ be repealed and returned to the Board of Finance for reconsideration and a recommendation of a lower cost proposal?’ ”

Asked why he’s pursuing this, Nowacki said: “Because we discovered evidence that was not shared with the Board of finance and the Town Council relating to enrollment projections that were in fact faulty, and in talking to the guy that runs [the New England School Development Council] that did a report on projections, I found out that they did not give all the proper information to the company that did the report.”

Specifically, Nowacki said a Nov. 9 presentation at the Board of Education included information about decreased year-over-year elementary school enrollment for the current academic year that was not sufficiently distributed.

“We are not for building nothing—we just feel as though we are over-building just like we did with Town Hall, and learning nothing from these experiences,” he said.

If successful, the ‘notice of intent’ for which Nowacki is garnering signatures this week would halt the appropriation process temporarily, Weber said.

Asked whether that would hold up the Saxe Building Committee’s work on its planned renovation and expansion, Penny Rashin—the committee’s chair—said no.

“The town bodies gave us pre-construction funding so we will continue to work to set up the project to move forward,” she said. “I do not see the schedule being delayed if there is not a referendum.” (See a full statement from Rashin below.)

Asked how confident he felt about gaining all 600-plus signatures that he’d need to force the referendum vote, Nowacki said: “There is a number of things that will happen that will help that to happen and I don’t want to go into the details of those things until they are up and running, but there is a plan, and I have got lots of data on how to go about it.”

A successful referendum vote requires not only a majority of those voting, but the total number of voters must be at least 15 percent of registered electors. Again, even if successful there, the referendum would only move the vote back to the Board of Finance for further review “reconsideration and a recommendation of a lower cost proposal.” The finance board last month voted unanimously in favor of the $18.6 million project.

What follows is a full statement from Rashin on the situation:

“The Saxe Building project addresses 3 established needs: 

1. The auditorium will be fully refurbished and brought up to code. The 58 year old auditorium was left out of the last 1997 Saxe project and was closed a year ago when PCBs were discovered in it.
2. 12 net additional classrooms will be added to resolve the overcrowding caused by increased student population, changes in curriculum and new state mandates.
3. Overcrowded music rooms will be right-sized and critical storage space provided for the auditorium and music spaces. This project has been thoroughly analyzed by the Town. After many detailed presentations, the Board of Education, Board of Finance and Town Council each unanimously passed the project. At three different hearings before the Town Council and the Board of Finance numerous residents spoke overwhelming in favor of the project. 

“In the 1997 construction, Saxe was built for about 1200 students. 1329 students fill the halls at Saxe daily now and as a result numerous space constraints have been made. The latest enrollment projections for Saxe were done by Dr. Kennedy at New England School Development Council (NESDEC) and utilize the fall 2015 enrollment numbers and other available data. These projections were shared with the Board of Education, Board of Finance and Town Council. Projected enrollments at Saxe are:

• 2015-2016 1329 (current)
• 2016-2017 1347
• 2017-2018 1333
• 2018-2019 1336
• 2019-2020 1339
• 2020-2021 1341
• 2021-2022 1354
• 2022-2023 1376
• 2023-2024 1339
• 2024-2025 1341
• 2025-2026 1308

“NESDEC analyzes many factors in projecting New Canaan’s enrollment, including past and current enrollment, cohort survival rates, in-migration, birth rates, real estate sales and new housing construction. NESDEC does more than 250 enrollment projections and updates each year for school districts throughout New England.

“The proposed project sets Saxe up for continued success for the next 10 to 20 years. We hope all residents support it. For more information please go to http://www.ncps-k12.org/Page/992 or contact me at penny.rashin@ncps-k12.org. The 2015 report on enrollment is available at this site.”