GRANBY — After five months of weighing more expensive and expansive options to turn the West Street Building into town offices and a new Council on Aging, residents at Monday’s special Town Meeting returned to a $5.6 million project to move all town offices under one roof in part of the old elementary school building.
“We’re past the point where anyone is going to walk out of here feeling good with what happens tonight.” Select Board Chair Mark Bail said. “Anything other than renovating West Street Building blows a hole in our finances and severely risks blowing our deadline.”
During the special Town Meeting Monday, which took place just before the second half of annual Town Meeting, residents approved a $27.5 million budget for fiscal year 2026 and voted to spend $3 million — which was initially allocated to demolish the West Street School in April— toward renovations.
The West Street Building Committee, explains Bail, will work with the project’s architect to apply value engineering to the project’s design, meaning the amount of renovations will continue to decrease until the project comes in under budget.
“The committee has said, ‘here’s $5.6 million, tell us what you can do with it,’” Finance Committee Chair John Libera said. “Don’t tell us how to build a building. Don’t tell us how to set up processes that create a much bigger space than we might need. Don’t tell us how to make these things very luxurious. None of that.”
Public discussion on the future of West Street Building and its potential as a municipal epicenter for Granby began over two years ago. Town Offices are currently spread between three buildings: the Council on Aging, the Carnegie Library and the Annex, which will be sold in the next 18 months. In December 2023, Town Meeting approved $5.6 million for the project based on the West Street Building Committee’s projected costs at the time.
However, once the project’s operational project manager and architect further studied the building, they found the cost of required renovations mandated by state building codes nearly tripled to more than $14 million. Residents disapproved of the project’s price, voting down both the project at a special Town Meeting in April and a Proposition 2½ debt exclusion override vote at the ballot box in May.
“How many times will it take for the Select Board to realize that Granby residents do not want to renovate West Street school?” Richard Domeracki said. “There are just too many unknowns about the high school.”
Bail said he’s heard many suggestions for the West Street property from residents, including moving all offices into the Council on Aging or library, and building modular offices or a new structure on the property. However, Bail said, the demolition process will likely eat at least $2.5 million of the project’s budget, and any new construction likely will not get finished in time for the 18-month deadline when the Annex needs to be sold. Current municipal buildings are already tight and do not meet the town’s growing needs.
“Originally we had the $5.6 million for the renovation, and it was approved by the town, and now we’re sort of back to that same place where the vast majority of the people voted yes,” Maryann Munger said. “Let’s go forward.”
In order to keep town offices in the Annex for the next 18 months, residents also approved $37,500 to repave the property’s driveway. This labor is in lieu of rent payments for the remainder of the lease.
After the special Town Meeting, School Committee Chair Jennifer Bartosz read a statement on the School Department financial challenges in the face of rising operational and special education costs.
The department’s $12.5 million budget is a reduced-service budget, eliminating 8.5 positions and slimming down services offered to students.
“Managing these cost increases is becoming increasingly difficult to meet the demands of current academic standards, let alone position ourselves to meet future requirements,” Bartosz said. “This vicious cycle, if left unchecked, makes our schools less attractive to current and prospective families, and undermines our ability to offer the scope of learning opportunities our students deserve.”
Libera echoed Bartosz’s concerns as Granby’s operational expenses shot up $1.5 million this year alone. Health insurance specifically are increasing 18% and 20% for the town’s PPO and HMO plans, respectively. Insurance companies warn municipalities to expect similar increases each year until 2032.
“What had been a moderate financial slide is suddenly increasing in speed,” Libera said. “The sudden addition of almost $1.5 million to the baseline budget should be a wake up call for all of us. Doom has not arrived. We cannot predict it, but it sure looks visible.”
Ultimately, the town approved fiscal year budget for 2026 along with allocations of free cash and bond premiums to find the offset the tax burden on residents.
Emilee Klein can be reached at eklein@gazettenet.com
