Sparta school board gets a failing grade from the state

Sparta - The school board, which has struggled for the past year to make a decision on how to solve the high school’s overcrowded classrooms and the district’s growing student population, now finds itself with, perhaps, even fewer choices. School officials were meeting this week with professional staff to discuss the possibility of renovating and adding onto the existing facility that has stood for more than 50 years on Mountain Road off Route 517. The meetings come on the heels of the state’s rejection this week of a school board application to build a new high school on land in Station Park or off White Lake Road behind the Sparta Car Wash. Sparta Schools Superintendent Thomas Morton said the Department of Environmental Protection canceled the application that was submitted back in June because the board could not nail down a site or plan for building the proposed new school. “Basically, what the DEP is saying is that the board has to make a decision,” said Morton, who spearheaded plans to build a new school more than two years ago. “The board has to make a determination on whether it will build a new school or renovate its current one and hopefully that will be made in the near future.” Morton said the school board has up until one year to reapply to DEP without forfeiting any application fees. But school board president David Slavin said a decision should come in the next two weeks. “We heard one reality check tonight. We are taking every step to make sure the right decision is made,” he said. The board, which has already paid several few hundred-thousand dollars to study the student population crisis, is now facing a Jan. 23 deadline for applying with the Department of Education to hold a referendum in September that would ask taxpayers to support any possible new construction. School officials had asked architects charged with designing the proposed new high school to also explore adding onto the existing facility as an alternative, while pressing forward to identify land for a new facility. At the time, Morton said adding onto the existing high school would cost taxpayers about $73 million, not much less than a new building at another location. Since then, the cost of a new high school has escalated to upwards of $109 million, making a reversal in plans a little more attractive to both school officials determined to pass a referendum and leery taxpayers. In the past few months, the school board asked a committee of local volunteers to evaluate the proposed costs of building a new high school in Station Park or one off White Lake Road. The committee said this week that the numbers presented to the school board by the Spiezle Architectural Group were on target. “If you’re looking for something to achieve in the near term with the ability to control costs, renovating the school should be high on the list,” said Stanley Puszcz, a local volunteer from H2M, a Totowa-based architectural and engineering firm. This week, the board’s architect presented six new designs for renovation to the existing high school. But the board refused to put a price tag on any of the proposals until faculty and staff could determine if the planned classrooms would meet future academic and enrollment needs. “We’re still massaging that (costs),” said Slavin. “We’re not going to mention any numbers.” Up until the state’s rejection this week, school officials had been looking for more time to comply with the application to build a new high school on land that comprises township soccer fields No. 1 and No. 2 in Station Park, and the high school’s softball fields. School board member Mike Schiavoni said a demographic study performed in conjunction with the township planner paints a gloomy picture for the already overpopulated high school. The study found the high school population to be 112 students beyond capacity and growing, yet the K-4 student numbers had leveled off the past few years. Schiavoni said quantifying any population trends would be difficult, but must be monitored.