Quashnet School HVAC project grows to $11.5M after electrical and fire-suppression needs; two-thirds approval secured

Voters authorized $11.5 million in borrowing for Quashnet School HVAC, filtration, electrical upgrades and required fire-suppression systems after town and school officials described how initial HVAC work triggered further code-driven upgrades.

School Committee Chair Kathy Lewis explained that the project began as HVAC and air-filtration improvements, but engineering and design identified necessary electrical upgrades that in turn triggered building-code requirements for fire suppression in large portions of the building. Those cascading requirements caused the project cost to rise substantially; Lewis said the town has used school-choice funds where possible but the scale of building-code-related work requires borrowing. "When that happened, the project costs hit about 30% of the total cost of the building itself, which then triggers a need to upgrade the building code," Lewis said.

Citizens questioned the size of the request and whether prior custodial/maintenance and DPW responsibilities affected deferred-maintenance costs; a resident urged voting yes and noted prior transfers of custodial responsibility to DPW had contributed to deferred-maintenance backlogs. The article required a two-thirds vote; the measure passed (187–35) and will move forward as a multi-phase school facility upgrade with funds coming from the proposed borrowing and other earmarked school accounts where available.