The renovation of Town Hall and Hildreth House, which Town Meeting voters will likely be asked to approve next spring, will be among the most consequential and expensive projects undertaken by the town in a decade. But a workshop next week could be the only chance for residents to have a say in how the buildings are configured and how far they will be allowed to stretch to accommodate town programs.
The meeting—billed as a "charrette" or workshop—is scheduled for next Wednesday, Dec. 14, at 7 p.m. in Volunteers Hall of the Harvard Public Library. There, the Municipal Building Committee and LLB Architects, the firm hired to develop schematic designs and estimate costs for the renovations, will present at least three "diagrammatic ideas" for each building that vary in their cost and capacity to accommodate town programs.
The meeting comes at an awkward time of year, as residents scramble to complete their Christmas shopping and gather their families for traditional religious and town events. But Eric Broadbent, Chair of the Energy Advisory Committee and a liaison to the buildings committee, urged time-pressed citizens to attend.
"Think of it as your Christmas gift to the town," he said.
The conceptual drawings to be shown workshop attendees were not available to the Press in time for print publication (but will be on the Harvard Press website).
The building committee has asked its architects to prepare three approaches per building: one that accommodates 100 percent of known current and future town needs, a second that accommodates a smaller percentage—for example, 75 percent—and a third, to be determined. It's unclear whether cost estimates will be available. Last year, consultants hired by a prior buildings committee estimated renovating the two buildings could cost the town more than $5 million over the next four to five years.
The diagrams, according to a draft meeting announcement shared with the Press this week, "will explore [the] sizes and uses of the existing building spaces…describe…code compliant required changes and upgrades, and review thoughts and concepts for potential additions." Such drawings are not blueprints for construction, but visualizations of possible ways to fit employees, volunteers, files, offices, and meeting rooms into each building.
"This is your moment to choose between three alternatives for each building before too much work is done," Selectman Chair Marie Sobalvarro told the Press.
The town clearly wants to see a balance maintained between the needs of town programs for building space and the cost of providing it, she said. Because of the historic nature of the buildings involved, aesthetics will also play a role in any plan. But the charrette will help determine "the fulcrum," said Sobalvarro.
What makes the upcoming presentation next week so pivotal is the limited time left to develop and choose a final approach for each building in time for Town Meeting next spring. By the time the town residents get a second look at more complete designs for Town Hall and Hildreth House in mid-January, the building committee will have settled on a preferred concept and discarded the rest. Getting to that point will require the committee to sort through issues that have divided town boards since the spring.
At Town Meeting in April, the attendees voted overwhelmingly to spend $185,000 to create schematic designs for the renovation of both Town Hall and Hildreth House. The warrant article, Article 17, said that Town Hall would continue to serve town government and that Hildreth House would remain the town's senior center.
However, in a statement of intent endorsed by all but one selectman, Tim Clark, and read aloud at Town Meeting by then Chair Peter Warren prior to the vote on Article 17, Selectmen said they intended to limit the renovation of Town Hall to the building's existing footprint and to consider an expansion of the 100-year old structure only if it is required for compliance with building codes.
Though it has no legal force, some town officials consider the document to be binding. Through the fall there have been periodic skirmishes whenever someone suggests that an addition to Town Hall could be a cost effective way of accommodating town needs that might otherwise be left out of the renovated building.
The issue of a Town Hall addition is only one of several that lurk beneath all discussions of the buildings. The Hildreth House renovation has so far proved less controversial. The Old Library, a third municipal building in need of repairs, is, for the moment, off the table.
Selectman Ron Ricci is one of those who consider the statement of intent a binding document. He said he's worried that the "charrette" will be attended mostly by citizens who reject it.
"I just want to understand the process here," Ricci, a liaison to the building committee, said last week. "You're going to put a lot of effort into coming up with three schemes. And then you're going to get a random sampling of a handful of citizens and based on that [come up with a preferred scheme]?"
"No," answered building committee member Doug Coots. "Certainly not the way you've characterized it," he said to laughter from Ricci and others in the room."
"Yes, the people who show up will be self-selecting, to a certain degree," said Coots. "They will be interested citizens willing to put some time and energy into these two buildings. The rest of them will stay at home and not put anything into it until voting day."
But, added Coots, the building committee will follow a process in which it will measure what it hears at the charrette against "all of the other information that's floating in our heads from the last two years of listening to it." Then, at its next meeting, on Dec. 22, the committee will guide the architects "to create a preferred scheme that we actually think has merit and can suffer the slings and arrows from that point on."
Ricci later told the Press he just wanted to be sure that the direction of the committee was not unduly swayed by a single event. He said he will urge the more than 400 citizens on his own email list to attend the meeting in an email blitz later this week.
In the end, the five members of the building committee—with Selectmen and other town officials looking over their shoulders—will be the ones to decide which schematic design to recommend to the Selectmen. The Selectmen will decide whether to place the committee's design—or a modification—on the Town Meeting warrant. And the Finance and Capital committees will be asked to recommend spending on the option that is proposed.
Finally, Town Meeting voters, in one up or down vote, will get to decide whether to accept the design and fund construction on one or both buildings. All of this work must be completed within the next four months.
"This is a very condensed process," Drayton Fair of LLB Architects told the building committee last week. "We're tiptoeing through the tulips. We do need everyone to understand the urgency. Time is of the essence."
According to a draft schedule that project manager John Sayre-Scibona proposed to building committee members last week, a rough schematic design must be ready for Selectmen by the end of January and a final schematic design ready for review by the Finance Committee and other town boards by Feb. 28.
The tight schedule is a challenge, building committee co-chair Pete Jackson told the Press this week, "but it is possible."
LLB would not have agreed to take the job unless the firm thought it was possible, Jackson added. If there is a problem, he said, it would be more likely be "town generated." If the town can't make up its mind in time, then LLB and the committee won't be able to meet their deadlines.
"Decisions have to be made," Jackson said. "All the committees have to be ready to make decisions each step of the way without delay."