Plans for a new Andover High school cheaper than renovation option

Apr. 3—The Andover High School building project is estimated to cost between $480 million and $567 million, depending on which option the town ultimately choses.

The feasibility cost estimates for three options were revealed for the first time at a meeting of the Andover High School Building Committee on March 30, after having been initially delayed. The cost analysis was referred to as "high level," or rough.

Plans for adding and renovating the existing school came in as the most expensive, while the plan to build a new school with a new auditorium — which would replace the Collins Center — came in as the least costly.

James Liebman from HMFH Architects said the difference in cost was because the add-and-renovate option would take much longer to complete and is simply the largest. The cheapest option also comes with the smallest footprint.

Mark Johnson, the chair of the Building Committee, added that the main purpose of these estimates is to compare the options.

During the meeting the town's consultants on the project presented slides with various figures breaking down total and potential costs.

While the total project costs are much more, the construction costs run between $422.6 million and $372.7 million. The difference between construction cost and total project cost includes contingency expenses and other so-called "soft costs" like furniture and fixtures, utility company fees and construction testing. The most expensive option budgets more than $50 million for construction contingency and $89 million in other soft costs.

The cost per square feet comes out to between $810 and $844.

These potential price tags don't include other possible add-ons the town is considering, like a geothermal system or parking garage.

The tax impacts for the project for the cheapest option come out to an annual impact for the average tax bill of between $1,740 and $2,215, depending on interest rates.

Town Manager Andrew Flanagan presented the figures and added that the numbers were based on a 30-year borrowing plan and that the impact would be a blend of interest rates, since the town can't borrow the total amount at once.

As well as making the project a harder sell at Town Meeting the costs also present another issue. Estimates exceed the town's debt limit, which currently sits at $510.2 million with about $409 million currently available.

Flanagan has said the town may not be able to fund the project within the debt limit — the maximum the town can borrow — meaning the town currently can't legally pay for the work.

He outlined a few solutions at another Building Committee meeting on March 27, with many options requiring help from the state Legislature.

A town's debt limit isn't usually an issue for a school building project as long as it is proceeding with help from the Massachusetts School Building Authority, as those projects don't count toward the limit. However, this project is being done without help from the MSBA. After 10 rejections, the town argued that it was unlikely that the project would be approved while the elementary school construction project was still going on.

This issue caused the Building Committee to withdraw a proposed article from Town Meeting, during a meeting on March 27, which would have provided $1.3 million toward funding schematic design for the project. Committee members said during the meeting it would be difficult to convince residents to pay additional costs for a project they can't fund at the time.

They discussed instead funding the article at a Special Town Meeting, once the debt problem has been solved.

The construction costs were also presented in comparison to other high school building projects.

The most expensive project shown was the Revere High School project, which has a current construction cost of $417 million and a cost of $1,002 per square foot when escalated to 2025 costs. The cheapest per square foot project shown was the Bristol-Plymouth technical school with a cost of $241 million and a square foot cost of $628.

According to information from the National Center for Education Statistics, during the 2021-2022 school year Bristol-Plymouth had an enrollment of 1,332 students, Revere had 1,996 and Andover had 1,679.

The Building Committee plans to make a recommendation on which version of the project to go forward with by the end of April, according to a timeline.