Weehawken Township voters asked to support a $16M School Bond

Weehawken Township voters asked to support a $16M School Bond

Weehawken Reporter, 22-Jan-17

Weehawken will hold a special election on Jan 24 asking voters to support a $16M bond that will upgrade the schools heating and cooling systems as well as provide for increased security mandated by the state.

Board President Richard Barsa said the district will take advantage of a state 38.9% pay back program that will reduce the total cost to the district by about $6.5M.

This will result in about a $40-$45 increase annually on home assessed at $200,000, said Mayor Richard Turner.

But Barsa and Turner said some of this would be offset by savings as a result of improvement made to the three school buildings involved.

The district is required by the state to bring up security standards for Roosevelt School, Webster School and Weehawken High School. This will include new camera systems, new safety doors and such.

The work on the schools will do away with a current steam heating system that requires each school to heat the whole school when even one room such as the gym is in use and establish a zoned climate control system that could heat rooms individually. The utility saving as well as the estimated $70,000 in annual repairs to the stream heating could reduce the total tax impact, Barsa said.

School Superintendent Dr. Robert R. Zywicki said climate control for summer would allow the district to keep special education students in district and possibly become a host for out of town special students, reducing the $500,000 tuition tab the district currently pays to send students to schools in Bergen County.

The bond would also pay for upgrading the school district’s science labs, allowing it to continue and advance its STEM programs

Turner believes that the savings will be able to reduce the overall tax impact more than is projected. “We tend to be conservative in estimating savings,” Barsa said. Polls open at 2pm and close at 8pm.