New Natick High School

One of the biggest projects facing the town of Natick over the next several years is the construction of a new high school. The current high school was constructed in 1953, with renovations in 1964 and 1995. It has served Natick well, but the physical plant is deteriorating, and a new school needs to be built. Below are some pictures of the current high school.

Recently a location was selected, as well as an architect and a blueprint for the new school. The new building will be constructed on the tennis courts/baseball fields/soccer fields right next to the existing school.

During construction, one wing of the old school (the “B” wing) will need to be torn down. This wing, the ‘leftmost’ wing of the school as you face it, is closest to the construction site of the new building. In the picture below, we are looking at the left side of the high school, with the front to the right of the picture, and the back to the left (the chimney can be seen in the picture above for further orientation). In the foreground we can see the soccer fields where the new building is intended to be built, and we can see the “B” wing. The brick structure to the right of the B wing is a gym, which will also have to be torn down during construction.

Here’s another picture of the current high-school complex with a little height. Again, the left side of the complex below is what we are looking at in the picture above.

Here is one more picture of the construction site. If you went over to the Gym in the above picture, and turned around, this is what you would see:

How much will the new building cost? Estimates vary, but somewhere in the neighborhood of $80 million to $90 million seems to be the first take. The town has chosen to build a ‘model’ school to take advantage of significant state subsidies for the project. The model school chosen is the Whitman-Hanson model.

For the Natick portion of the cost, an over-ride will be necessary. That over-ride vote will take place in the town election this spring. If the over-ride passes, the new school could be completed in approximately 3 years. If the over-ride fails, Natick will go to the back of the line on the state’s priority list of schools. Natick would then have the choice of either funding the entire amount of the new school itself, or putting off the construction for many years until the town works its way back up the state funding priority list.

The over-ride vote is certain to be contentious, as all over-ride votes are, but in this case, I think it is pretty clear Natick needs to build a new high-school. There really isn’t a Republican/Democrat partisan angle that I can see – there are likely to be people on both sides of the issue from both camps. But as the largest spending issue facing Natick, I thought it was worth a mention.

Author: Mark