Regional school talks may open doors

Regional school talks may open doors

By Rachel H. Goldman

Staff Writer of the kennebunkPost.com

Regional School Unit 21 and Wells Ogunquit Consolidated School District representatives agree collaboration should be in their future even if a consolidated high school is not.

The two districts met again last Thursday to discuss the possibility of a regional high school for Arundel, Kennebunk, Kennebunkport, Wells and Ogunquit students.

Ogunquit Select Board Chairman Donato Tramuto initiated conversation about a regional school in March when he mailed letters to selectmen in RSU 21 towns Arundel, Kennebunk and Kennebunkport.

Tramuto proposed a meeting to explore options to “help us achieve an unmatched standard of education,” he wrote.

Municipal and school representatives from the five towns first met May 18 and school board representatives met again July 7 to discuss the possibility.

RSU 21 Superintendent Andrew Dolloff on Thursday presented the group with Harriman Architects’ cost estimates for expanding the current Kennebunk High School into a larger regional school. The firm is working with the district on current Kennebunk High School renovation plans.

Dolloff said the Maine Department of Education would require the regional school of 1,400 students be built on 40 acres of developable land.

He said building a regional school on the current Kennebunk High School site would be feasible because the property is 49 acres.

However, playing fields would have to be located elsewhere if a new regional high school was built on the Kennebunk High School site, he said. Fields at Kennebunk Elementary School or in Wells would be possibilities, he added. 

Dolloff said Harriman Architects agreed building a larger school on the Kennebunk High School site would be feasible, but would require a more expensive construction plan that includes destroying and rebuilding one of the school’s older wings to allow a three-story building.

Dolloff said Harriman Architects estimated the regional school project would cost $60 million. Kennebunk High School renovations are estimated at $35 million to $45 million. Wells-Ogunquit renovation plans are several years behind RSU 21  and the district does not have a cost estimate to renovate Wells High School. 

Dolloff said there are several funding options exist for regional school. He said charging Wells and Ogunquit students tuition in RSU 21 might be the most feasible option.

He said the payback over 20 years for a $60 million project would start at yearly payments of $5.5 million. Payments would decrease each year.

If RSU 21 charged 400 Wells and Ogunquit students tuition of around $8,800 a student, Wells-Ogunquit would pay approximately $3.5 million dollars a year while RSU 21 would foot $2 million a year plus additional staffing costs.

“It’s very complicated as to how cost-sharing would work out,” Dolloff said. “We’d have to model different scenarios to figure out if tuitioning is really the best way or would it be cost-sharing where we have separate governing boards with a cost-sharing formula like the one among our three (RSU 21) towns that take into account student enrollment and property valuation.”

Wells-Ogunquit Superintendent Elaine Tomaszewski agreed the cost aspect of the regional school project would be especially complicated.

“All consolidations complicate when you get to financials,” she said. “And this one would be extremely complicated.”

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