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LHS4ALL 101
LHS4ALL Supports Building a New High School
at a reasonable price,
properly sized for our student population,
and that does not take away our town recreation fields.
LHS4ALL was formed in late Spring 2024, and it is comprised of residents of Lexington who are concerned about the direction of the new LHS project. This primer will not go into the entire history of why and how the town is building a new high school, other than to say that a new high school has been an active topic for many years. The current high school is old and in need of repair. Recently (2020 time frame) the Town was invited by the Massachusetts School Building Authority (MSBA) to submit a project proposal to build a new LHS, for funding consideration by the MSBA. MSBA will not pay for an entire school, but will contribute funds to help defray the cost.
When we became aware of the proposed project's $600M+ price tag, we began looking into the decisions and choices of the School Building Committee. We did not agree with some of the choices that were being made, and how the committee arrived at those decisions. The three main concerns are:
1) The price of the new high school.
The $600M+ price tag is going to increase taxes on the average homeowner by approximately $2000 per year for 30 years. Furthermore, the Town did not specify a 'budget' or limit of what it would spend. We feel this was a critical project planning error that contributed to some of the high costs we are seeing now.
2) The size of new high school.
While initially the size of the school was not an issue, it soon became a key concern when the impact of the MBTA Communities initiative, and Lexington's obligations to this initiative become clear. There are already numerous proposals to build hundreds to thousands of new multifamily residences all across Lexington. We believe the Town needs to pursue a more creative, phased approach to building the school, one that buys the town time to better estimate future enrollment, instead of building one large school now.
3) The location of the new high school.
The designs favored by the SBC are based on building the new LHS on our beautiful Town Recreation fields. This is non-negotiable. Our town recreation fields are a jewel of open space right in the center of Lexington. These need to be protected. In fact, State of MA Article 97 provides legal protection for this land. In 2015, the same architect designing new LHS today (SMMA) developed a master plan for Lexington Public Schools which did not impact the fields. Therefore, we should stay off the fields and build new LHS on the existing site of the current high school.
There are alternative approaches to building new LHS that can give us the best of both worlds - we can reduce the cost, build the right size and keep our beautiful fields intact, all while delivering the best education. LHS4ALL has proposed one possible option - it is called THRIVE.
If you agree with these positions, then we invite you to join the campaign for a new LHS built at the right price, the right size, and in the right place. Thank you for your consideration.