Woodrow Wilson Building Committee

WWMS Building Committee August 30, 2018 Minutes Present: Christopher Drake, Gene Nocera, Sheila Daniels, John Giuliano, Richard Pelletier, Kristen Byrd, Ted Raczka Absent: Mary Bartolotta, Phil Pessina, John Phillips, Christopher Bonsignore Also Present: Dr. Conner, TSKP Mr. Szczypek and Mr. Luther, MS Mary-Lynn Radych, John Cross, Michele- Public Present: 5 people Vice Chair Drake opens the meeting at 6:04 p.m. Public Comment is opened at 6:05 p.m. He asks if there is any member of the public who wishes to address the committee. Seeing no one, he closes public comment at 6:05 p.m. Approval of the minutes: Richard Pelletier moves to approve the minutes of July 26, 2018; Gene nocera seconds. There is no discussion. The vote is called and it is unanimous to approve with six aye votes. The Vice Chair declares the minutes approved. Old Business RFP Construction Manager update: Vice Chair Drake asks for an update on the bid. Mr. Cross states they received 7 proposals and they met the minimum requirements for submission; numbers look very good and no surprises in his opinion. We want to get to four companies from the list. They are all good companies. He names the seven companies. Their proposals are in front of the group. They need to be evaluated for interviews. Vice Chair Drake states your recommendation is to narrow it down to four and interview the four. He opens the floor for discussion. Noted for the Record Ted Raczka joins the meeting at 6:07 p.m. Vice Chair Drake opens the discussion with stating they (the committee) are okay with John narrowing it down to four and how many interviews to do in a day and is asking what the committee wants to do moving forward. MS Daniels asks about the interviews. Mr. Cross recommends two firms in each of two days; it is a presentation of ½ hour and then time for questions and answers. We need to get this right. Two hours, two firms in two days. 1 Vice Chair Drake asks for thoughts. Dr. Nocera likes the suggestion. He asks the total amount. Mr. Cross states when their proposal was put together, it was for 73 million. The numbers were where I anticipated and some are pretty good. I am happy with the range. Vice Chair Drake asks how to get to four from seven and asks John’s recommendation. John went through the proposals and he is willing to meet with a subcommittee and present his thoughts and bring the suggestions to the committee. He doesn’t think it will take long. All seven firms are solid in the proposal and we owe it to them to do our due diligence. Dr. Nocera states he was involved two other times involved in this process at this point and the committee felt it was appropriate for the district facility manager to present the recommendation to a subcommittee and then a decision was made. Vice Chair Drake states that makes sense, but timing is important. TSKP states the CM should be on board by September 28 to allow them to be on board for the end of the schematic. MS Daniels suggests that you put them in the order of preference and then we can review the information and then decide who to call in for interviews. Vice Chair Drake states we can structure it and schedule a subcommittee meeting to do that sometime next week, which is a four day week. The committee could identify its four and we could alert via email what the subcommittee decided and have a meeting of the whole to decide that those are the four to interview and schedule the interviews. If we want to delegate to the subcommittee the power to choose the four and set the interviews. We can do that. Dr. Nocera that is how we did it; the whole committee didn’t need to come back. Vice Chair Drake asked if people not on the committee serve on this vetting committee; John Cross other than my staff, I would hesitate to do that. My preference is it should be this committee. Vice Chair Drake states we would have to notice the subcommittee meeting and who would be ready willing and able to do that. Dr. Nocera states he will skip the school visit and volunteers; Rich Pelletier volunteers; Kristen Byrd volunteers; Vice Chair Drake states we would have to do it after 4 p.m. MS Byrd asks if after 3 p.m. John Giuliano is willing to be involved. Vice chair Drake will reserve himself and Mary. Dr. Nocera states Thursday or Friday is best. Vice Chair Drake states Thursday is the Guilford High School Tour. MS Byrd states her schedule is open. John Cross asks if they can do it at 2:30. MS Byrd states 2:41 the bell rings for the end of the School day. Vice Chair Drake states Tuesday is no go for him; principal offers library at WWMS for the meeting. John Cross states it will be at least an hour. Dr. Nocera states Tuesday at 3:30 at WWMS Library. Dr. Nocera apologizes he can’t do Tuesday but he can do Wednesday. Wednesday at 3:30 p.m. WWMS Library. Vice Chair Drake wants a motion to create a subcommittee to choose 4 Construction Manager at risk firms for interview. Mr. Raczka moves that a subcommittee be formed to choose the four firms for interviews for Construction Manager at risk; MS Daniels seconds. No discussion. Vote is unanimous with seven aye votes. The members Drake, Bartolotta, Nocera, Giuliano, Byrd, and Pelletier. They will meet Wednesday September 5 at 3:30 at WWMS at the Media Center. Commissioning Agent Update: It is identifiable as CX and the Vice Chair asks for update. Mr. Cross states it (RFP) is written drafted and ready to go to the City for final review. Vice Chair Drake asks 2 who does the final review. Mr. Cross responds he does it with Donna Imme. Vice Chair Drake asks where it is now. Mr. Cross states he wants to talk to the committee; it is drafted and he is comfortable with the language. Vice Chair Drake asks if it comes back to the Committee for approval. Mr. Cross states you will need to approve the advertising. Mr. Giuliano read the entire document and likes that the CX will come back 10 months after the building is open to review with the staff. Vice Chair Drake asks if there is a motion is to approve the draft of CX; Vice Chair Drake will take John’s word. Mr. Pelletier moves to approve the CX proposal with any amendments made by purchasing Dr. Nocera seconds. Ryszard Szczypek, TSKP states looking for a budget line item I recommend $150,000 for the budget line item. Vice Chair Drake asks for an amendment to the motion to include $150,000. Mr. Pelletier and Dr. Nocera move and second an amendment to include a budget line for $150,000. Vice Chair Drake asks those in favor to vote aye for the CX RFP for no more than 150,000. It is unanimous. The Vice Chair states the motion carries. A. The initial meeting is scheduled for September 18 at 10:30 a.m. at the BOE building. B. There are two bills from TSKP; Vice Chair Drake everyone is clear we have two invoices one for$ 50,000 and a second for $112,500. He asks for a motion to approve payment. Mr. Raczka moves to approve; MS Daniels seconds. No discussion. The vote is unanimous to approve. Vice Chair Drake states the matters are approved. C. Visit to Guilford is September 6 at 3 p.m. It is 605 New England Road. We will meet with the Principal whom Mr. Szczypek asked to conduct a tour for the committee. I asked him to speak freely. You should find it helpful. Vice Chair asks who is going. John Giulian, Kristen Byrd, Sheila Daniels, Dr. Conner, and Mary Bartolotta. D. State Pre-planning Meeting was requested by the State, and they indicated who they wanted to be there and that is september 11, at 9 a.m. Vice Chair Drake talks about the reimbursement process with the State; however the mechanics have changed and put forward a new system that ties in with the new state system. They were clear the account set up for reimbursements and that will be owned by Dr. Conner. Natalie Forbes will be the point person for the BOE. Vice Chair Drake states initial meeting kicked off the need for the preprep meeting and they set the guest list and it is 9/11 at 9 a.m. at DAS. E. Update from TSKP. Mr. Szczypek states the floor plans look different from what we have seen. He will ask Randall to walk through the process of this. He wants direction on a tabled item and that is the geo technical services required. It is analysis of soils for the structural engineer to design the foundation. He gave three proposals and Mary suggested we table it until today. Dr. Nocera adds the geothermal analysis to the agenda, geotechnical engineering to the agenda; Mr. Pelletier seconds. The vote is unanimous and the motion passes. Vice Chair Drake asks they continue. 3 Mr. Szczypek passes out copies of the three proposals he received for geotechnical engineering of the site. They will be retained by TSKP. We retained services of Michael Horton and they area structural engineering firm and they need the opinion of a soil engineer to see if the site needs to be dewatered, the site filled if the material is not suitable to hold a structure. We asked for a map to see where the borings need to be done and they will call before you dig to see if utilities are properly mapped, do the borings and come back with the soil bearing capacity of the site. They obtained three quotes from geotechnical engineers. One is Geoinsight with an office in Middletown. There fee is $9,195 to do the borings and write a report; the second is from Langan Engineering and they are in New Haven and other locations and they gave TSKP a lot of numbers; there proposal is $16,900 for the same work of soil borings and writing a report. Milone and MacBroom did the third one and their proposal is$ 13,000. We worked with all of them and all are capable of doing the work and based on fee we would do GeoInsight. Vice Chair Drake states one firm is kind of based in Middletown and one who did the work for th playing fields across the street. And Langan is high. Vice Chair Drake states from budgetary perspective and original costs is in the budget. Mr. Szczypek states $60,000 is in the budget for this work and you have committed $20,000. Dr. Nocera states that Milone and MacBroom also did Pat Kidney. He adds that they have done the borings across the way and they may have insight about the site. Water and soil in this area is a huge issue. Mr. Raczka states he has worked with Geo Insight for projects and they are cost effective. This is a big project and I have been part of these projects and we should save money where we can; there may be things we want to put into the building so if we can save money here or there, we are saving money to put something in the building that directly affects students. Vice Chair Drake is the motion is to approve which firm to hire. He asks if there is a service fee. Mr. Szczypek states we add 10% as part of the contract. Honestly it covers the additional premiums on insurance. You can contract with them directly, but if we carry them, we have costs. Mr. Raczka moves to have TSKP enter into contract with GeoInsight; Dr. Nocera seconds the motion. The Vote is called and it is unanimous to hire GeoInsight. The Chair states the matter passes approving GeoInsight to do this work. Mr. Szczypek thanks the Committee. Mr. Szczypek introduces Mary-Lynn Radych an architect at the firm. Randall Luther states people have noticed the plan has changed. Since the last meeting, we have been developing the plan and have started meetings with the staff to flush out the plans. We met with John and the HVC guy and we are zeroing in on the mechanical solution. We also met with P and Z staff and walked them through the project and we wanted to know the permitting process and if public hearings are needed; we don’t see that as a scheduling hurdle. The zoning person asked if they were closing the road and there was push back. Closing the road would not affect what we are doing, but we would accept the road closure. Mr. Szczypek states an interesting point to keep in mind if it remains a street are improvements to it and they are not eligible for reimbursement. If it is off the property, it is improvements off site and if we have changed boundaries to make it part of the site so it is reimbursable. 4 Mr. Luther shows where they were and shows the changes.The classroom block has not changed dramatically. The changes are inside the classroom bar. The second floor, one thing mentioned was the distance from the nurse to the most remote classroom on the third floor. Ms Radytch did a study to decide how long it takes from nurse to farthest corner. It is a little over a 3 minute walk, over 700 feet and by changing it it is 500 feet and a two minute walk. The building is compact compared to what you currently have. It is ideal for access for emergency vehicles and school based clinic. They have revised the area. Mr. Raczka states the Aux gym seems rarely used and the locker rooms were not the right size at the High School and they built locker rooms near the fields so I am hoping you will sit with Athletic people to see if this is appropriate. He is not sure the locker sizing is correct and the aux gym might be reduced in size and do we really need it. Mr. Luther states it is his intention to meet with all the representatives of all constituencies, probably twice, and after the plan details are done, we will go back again. MS Byrd states the small gym would be larger; there are 3 PE teachers teaching at the same time and they need more room; 90 kids in one gym area is not safe. Mr. Raczka is not wedded to any exact changes, but he is addressing what he has seen. Mr. Luther states team rooms are also larger in high schools. MS Byrd states the size is what we need and if we can make it larger, we should. Dr. Nocera states on input from staff, I don’t know what has occurred and assuming a lot has and staff is weighing in on the design so far. Mr. Luther states it is only upper level administrators. Dr. Nocera states I sent you a short video and my feeling of the design process, the staff has to be involved with the fundamental question how we want kids to learn in the future. Because we had an aux gym in the old school, we may need something similar, but it may be multi-purposed for what the school needs to do. A committee of staff should get together soon to talk about the school and inspirations for future curriculum be imbedded in the design. The curriculum should drive the design process. It is understanding by design. The thinking is to design the school backwards; curriculum forward not bricks and mortar. He is proposing a committee of teachers so they can weigh in. Mr. Luther states all those things, the Superintendent is invested in and he has been pushing us in that direction and in our experience it is more productive to have something to react to than an abstract concept so we can start moving things around. Dr. Nocera that is a fair position to take but the design has to come from how we want kids to learn. We don’t want to end up with something that is uninspiring. Mr. Luther states that will not happen. Vice Chair Drake a lot of the initial work to lay out the square footage was done with Dr. Charles and she had a team of faculty and administrators she worked with. He states he was involved with a group and the PE people had some concern on the classroom and you shaved square footage from classrooms and gave it to the gym. Mr. Luther states we are editing and modifying the Ed Spec, adding a Flex lab and taking out a redundant lab and at some point that will stop and the ed spec is what we are looking for and we will come back to this committee and the BOE to adopt it. Vice Chair Drake asks when that will take place. Mr. Luther states it will be in the next two to three months. Vice Chair Drake you will go back to the Board to refine the plans and they will re-adopt some job specs keeping the 150,000 square footage. Mr. Luther states we want the Construction Manager on board so we are not pitching something you can’t afford. Vice Chair Drake states Dr. Charles did a lot of horse trading the 5 first time and I assume more will occur. Mr. Luther states once we understand the curriculum, some areas could get bigger or smaller. Dr. Nocera on the new plan, I really like the second floor circulation space. That is so important to talk about. Mr. Luther responds on the upper floor the only thing we discussed was physically disable suite and the discussion is the area of refuge in the stairs, but I walked away saying why can’t we make it work at grade and we did. One of the things about the old plan that concerned me is the building is a lot shorter, but still is a long building and we had a 500 foot straight shot corridor and it was in the back of our mind to address that. MS Radych began wiggling pieces around to make it more interesting and it created a large space between the blocks and that space breaks up the long corridor and is a big gathering space; we thought why can’t the cafeteria be more like a food court outside the auditorium and it is more central and we did that. We moved the caf into the center space and the kitchen space is where it was and service stays were it is and he shows the flow of the students into the area. The main floor, it does some nice things. We have added step seating, a little amphitheater that leads to the dining area or the kids can sit in the stadium seats. This looks out at your stadium field across the street at the 50 yard line. If there are functions in the gym, you can go down the steps to the cafe and now the whole center of the building is opened up. There was another concern the lower level will feel like a basement and now this opens it up and there is more light. There is an issue with a three story open space and we suggest it is closed off with glass; if it is opened to the third level you have to have smoke control and this discourages a three story drop of junk. Those are all positive developments. Mr. Pelletier asks is there a means for disabled individuals. Mr. Luther shows the elevator is just across away from the main stairs and they are looking at a separate service elevator, disabled individuals will have a second elevator. The physical disabled suite is on the main level and near the nurse and makes more sense here. He shows the exterior model to show how the building works. It is an architectural way to articulate the ed specs. We can color code them and everyone knows where they are and when their house is. The central entrance is between the gym and auditorium and you can look across to the field. You can see all the houses and it is a sense of community and identity. Dr. Nocera points out the advantage of a rear entrance and schools recognize that for safety purposes. If there is a courtyard in the back you can enhance that entrance and makes parents feel better about the security. Mr. Luther states the area in front of the entrance will be busses only; there will be a device to keep people from getting in easily. On the classroom side that is close to the street we need to develop architectural features to prevent that. He shows looking from one end to the back and shows the cafe area. In Guilford, the Cafe is a lobby and this space will be more dynamic than Guilford and you can see it when you go there. He wanted to bring up the big change regarding the cafeteria and looking at an assembly space; you can go outside a classroom and use the space. Dr. Nocera on walls between the classrooms; have you worked with firms that have state of the art that walls can be dismantled if there is co-teaching. Mr. Luther we have done that and we have not had that conversation on that; each tower and each floor could have that and would be your flex space. Dr. Nocera states a lot of classes have co-teaching but have to do it around a door. Mr. Luther it is not 6 uncommon to have communicating doors between classrooms and serves as a security issue and you might look at. Mr. Giuliano comments that stair case you talked about is inside the building; Mr. Luther yes. Mr. Giuliano asks how high the building will be; floors are 14 feet and it will be 42 feet high. Mr. Giuliano states some people on Ridge Road were inquiring about the height of the school. Mr. Luther replies we are cognizant of that. Our building compares to this building here next door to us. Mr. Giuliano asks from logistics perspective; will it be they are in a tunnel. Mr. Szczypek states no. Dr. Nocera asks about the exterior. Mr. Luther we are all over the map on that. Dr. Nocera you do have the coloring of the old school and we did try to copy that at the new fields and I through that out there. Mr. Luther has talked about the red brown and white and how to use it. Mr. Giuliano is of the same opinion of Gene; the current color scheme is yellow and black and I don’t like that. Dr. Nocera states the yellow is daffodil yellow; they researched the original yellow. There is not a lot of yellow in the park. I am more interested in integrating with the neighborhood. Vice Chair Drake states the floor between the third and second floor is glassed in; where is that. Mr. Luther states it is a window. Mr. Szczypek states if there is a three story space we have to evacuate that space quickly and to avoid that we put in a glass wall because it is cheaper. Mr. Giuliano asks if there are skylights at the very top. Mr. Luther states the roof will have some skylights so you don’t need artificial lights during the day. If you said a solid roof and a big block of glass I would go with that. Mr. Szczypek states you don’t need a big skylight to let a lot of light in. They have come a long way and we have done them successfully in the past. Guilford has them. MS Daniels asks the inside corridor are their windows to the classrooms to the corridor. Mr.Luther states we are not there yet. My preference would be to make it transparent and there is an issue of security in lock down situations; we would probably do opaque and the other sight will be all glass in the house. MS Daniels asks they hope to keep it in mind and pay attention to; I have a problem being a classroom with no windows. Mr. Luther there will be no room without windows. MS Daniels states it would be better to face that way because of the light and natural light. Mr. Giuliano states practically skylights just. . . Mr. Szczypek wants to visit the school to see the problem so we don’t repeat it. John Cross explains the problem. Dr. Nocera speaking of a building that the architect brought in light is Snow School brought it in with glass from the exterior of the hallway to bring in the feeling of light into the classroom. Vice Chair Drake on the first floor at the nook near the media center, we are dealing with grades in the back of the building, can we have a loading dock there. Mr. Luther shows the grade and they will berm it down and add it and it will work well and it is down and hidden. It will be concealed. Vice Chair Drake this is the mechanical and the need to deliver; Mr. Luther it is the service area. Vice Chair Drake the door between technical and custodial area that will be workable. Mr. Luther what we don’t know is the delivers and the trash, is it front loading; do we want a loading dock and if we need more space, we might not be able to slope it, but build a wall and there is space there. Vice Chair Drake states the cafes have exterior facing doors and is that taken away, but you have the back entrance where food prep is taking place. Vice Chair Drake the music rooms you consistently used pinkish, it has turned into a giant block. Mr. Luther states when 7 they put color in, the lines are not shown but that area stayed the same. Mr. Giuliano sent 41 questions; Mr. Luther asked if you got the answers. He states as they looked at the program in more detail what wasn’t shown is requirement for instrument storage and Mary Lynn laid it out and that is why the area has grown a bit. Vice Chair Drake asks what do you envision on the first floor squeezed in between the caf and auditorium. Mr. Luther states that is bathrooms. He states you can enter from the main lobby and you can enter on the bottom. Mr. Szczypek it is a sloping floor. Noted for the Record Ms Byrd and Mr. Raczka leave the meeting. is good for them. Mr. Luther states we have not spoken to them, but we can now that we have this. Mr. Giuliano states for the media center and technology next door will those spaces be intertwined. Mr. Luther states we are talking about that and the Tech space more of a makerspace and that is our vision, but we have to figure it out. MS Daniels states that fits Gene’s idea to open the wall. Mr.Giuliani states that is good for the public to use the space after hours. Vice Chair Drake asks where do you go from here. It is starting to look more like a school. Mr. Luther states the color blobs need to be worked out and we have to see what it looks like in terms of windows and exterior materials. We will have a package of drawings to adequately describe the scope of the project and in two months we will have an estimate and we will have a series of drawings so you know what everything looks like and it will be more detailed and worked through the design detail. The big goal is to have all the scope identified so the Construction Manager can put an accurate number on things. We have been going through the building because we have to tear off the auditorium and there are utilities that will make it a challenge and then separate the pool and gym and we have to get our handle on it so someone can put a price on it. That is the scope of the schematic design. Vice Chair Drake asks when do you want faculty and administration involved. Mr. Luther state s it will be a two stage process. Christine reached out to Dr. Conner who he wants to be involved and we are letting him set the tone on how the meetings will occur. Once the plan is firmed up, we will circle back to them and that will be the second round, six months from now. Mr. Luther states the next 8 weeks is really fun. When we come back with the final schematic we will have some renderings. Dr. Nocera asks about lavatories in schools and has the State Statutes changed. Mr. Luther stated there was a change in plumbing code at events and more fixtures for women than men. In this building there will be a family room centrally located. Mr. Szczypek states they have a need for a lactation room. Mr. Luther states they can find room for one if it is needed. Vice Chair Drake states he is fixated on FOIA; subcommittee will be meeting and we will have to schedule for two interview dates and there is no problem with that but getting the agenda out in 24 hours. Motion to Adjourn Dr. Nocera moves to adjourn and Mr. Pelletier seconds the motion. The vote is called and it is unanimous to adjourn. The Vice Chair adjourns the meeting at 8:04 p.m. 8 9