If the sitework at Hartwell is so expensive, maybe the CCBC should have more seriously considered other less expensive options like buying a building near the Mall as a senior center (leave Leap out of the picture) , and re-invigorate our town center.
It's not too late to vote NO and reopen a healthy discussion of needs vs wants for a small town of our size. Peter Buchthal Weston Rd On Thu, Jun 5, 2025 at 12:33 PM Seth Rosen <[email protected]> wrote: > Margaret, why are you convinced proposing a new design would cost as much > or more than the current plan? If you scale it down to encompass actual > necessity, we can build it much cheaper. There were three budgets > proposed and we chose the most expensive one. Now we can't deliver that > scope, so let's reduce scope. That feels like a great use of resources. The > idea that "we've already done a bunch of work, so we can't stop now" is > what I take issue with. > > It's cheaper to write off some work and time than to proceed with > something that we can't afford, don't need and that's way over-budget. > > Seth > > > > On Thu, Jun 5, 2025 at 12:22 PM Margaret Olson <[email protected]> > wrote: > >> David Cuetos said: >> <snip> >> >>> Anyone who has followed the CCBC’s process knows there were certain >>> “luxuries” included in the project vision that could have been trimmed. I >>> haven’t followed their work since town Meeting, but I’d think removing the >>> teaching kitchen, cheaper finishes and cutting down on site work would all >>> move the needle materially >>> >> </snip> >> >> Unfortunately, the site work is a relatively large portion of the CC cost >> and equally unfortunately it's not likely that it can easily be reduced. >> The site is very constrained by wetlands (see the GIS) and some of it is in >> the buffers. This by law requires mitigations, and mitigations are >> expensive. >> >> If I were to poke fault at the CCBC process it is that the cost >> implications of the wetland and a larger vs smaller footprint building were >> not explained to the town. We were asked what we would prefer for a design, >> not how much (in $) we preferred it. Having served as a town volunteer on >> boards and committees for many years I have a pretty good idea why it was >> done this way - it's an extremely hard sort of question to ask of an >> electorate and get any kind of coherent answer. >> >> All that being said, I don't think a redesign is a good use of my tax >> money. Could we get a more cost effective building? Maybe, but we would >> have to start from scratch and at the end of the day starting from scratch >> would wind up costing just as much as the current plan even with it's cost >> increases. As FinCom, Andy Payne, and others have pointed out. It would be >> a largely pointless use of town time and resources. We're a small town with >> limited staff. There are only so many projects or issues they can tackle at >> once because there just aren't that many staff. >> >> Margaret >> -- >> The LincolnTalk mailing list. >> To post, send mail to [email protected]. >> Browse the archives at >> https://pairlist9.pair.net/mailman/private/lincoln/. >> Change your subscription settings at >> https://pairlist9.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/lincoln. >> >> -- > The LincolnTalk mailing list. > To post, send mail to [email protected]. > Browse the archives at https://pairlist9.pair.net/mailman/private/lincoln/ > . > Change your subscription settings at > https://pairlist9.pair.net/mailman/listinfo/lincoln. > >
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