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5 BEFORE THE WYOMING STATE LEGISLATURE
6 SELECT SCHOOL CAPITAL CONSTRUCTION COMMITTEE
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9 SELECT SCHOOL CAPITAL CONSTRUCTION COMMITTEE PROCEEDINGS
August 30, 2001
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1 P R O C E E D I N G S
2 (Committee proceedings commenced
3 8:40 a.m., August 30, 2001.)
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: I would like to call this
5 meeting to order and welcome you all to Cheyenne. We
6 won't consider it necessarily the end of the summer, but
7 we may be forced to.
8 Your chairmen have been awaiting further word
9 from the Court, and it has not been forthcoming at this
10 point, but we felt we had to move along. There were
11 issues we could move on. A lot of work has been done, and
12 there's a lot, I think, that we can begin on, and so we're
13 about that today.
14 As you remember, we had an extensive amount of
15 information presented to us in the previous meeting on
16 kind of a general situation and everything from how we
17 finance this to how we structure it. We even looked at
18 water commission's sort of structure, we looked at a
19 number of reports from different people.
20 We then asked for the variety of the tasks
21 involved in this to be delineated by Management Council as
22 to where those responsibilities were, and ours is
23 primarily the establishment of a system and a structure
24 that will deal with capital construction. Pieces of the
25 revenue package and pieces of the financing package of
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1 that have been assigned to two other committees, to
2 Revenue Committee and to the Capital Investments
3 Committee.
4 And while we need to be aware of pieces of
5 those, and we'll try to keep you apprised of parts of
6 that, because I think it is real important to understand
7 it as we go along, it has also been educational. I sit on
8 Revenue and some of those members sit on Capital
9 Investments, and it has been, I think, helpful for them to
10 get involved in the issue.
11 You will appreciate the fact that they are
12 struggling with, "Well, I want a definite figure. Well, I
13 need something solid." And it is like, "We all do, but it
14 is not there."
15 So we're going to keep narrowing that down and
16 we're going to keep working on it. And they're only
17 beginning to feel the magnitude and the frustration of the
18 work that you've been trying to grapple with for quite
19 some time, I think. It is not just something they're
20 accustomed to that is absolutely solid that you can get
21 your arms around and you know exactly what you've got. So
22 we're going to continue to keep trying to narrow that down
23 in our process today.
24 We've had projects in process. We have projects
25 coming on. And we need to get a system in here to handle
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1 it and we have people who have been working with it.
2 This morning we're going to look at the review
3 of the statewide assessment of school buildings and a
4 discussion of the capital construction issues which should
5 bring us a lot closer to getting narrowed where we want to
6 begin to look or begin to start on some of these.
7 And I know you've been getting your ample supply
8 of reading materials from this committee as well as
9 others, but I hope you can keep up with what we're sending
10 because we are trying to keep it concentrated to what is
11 important.
12 And there was a very good packet that has come
13 out on school construction assistance programs in the
14 various states. I'm asking the committee to get you --
15 you've got issues for our cap con committee, and then I've
16 asked you to get another copy which you'll be getting
17 later today on, you know, more the professional side of
18 this: What can the professionals contribute on this and
19 what do we need to consider we have a place for? Because
20 I think those are all things we need to consider.
21 So with that, we'll move into the review of
22 state assessment, unless anyone has anything else.
23 Then Dodds Cromwell from MGT, if you would walk
24 us -- take us through the statewide assessment of school
25 buildings.
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1 And some have worked more closely with this than
2 others and some don't work with this at all through the
3 years. So just go ahead and get us up to speed where we
4 would need to be to understand this.
5 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, thank you for
6 the opportunity to work with the committee.
7 In 1997-'98 the State undertook a statewide
8 assessment of all the district-owned buildings in the
9 state which included school buildings and noneducational
10 buildings such as bus barns or maintenance shops and so
11 on.
12 That assessment had three key elements: A
13 physical condition assessment of the buildings, an
14 educational suitability assessment of the school
15 buildings, and a technology readiness assessment of the
16 school buildings.
17 Just briefly kind of go through what those
18 assessments were about and then in more detail I want to
19 go over the condition assessment and how it is scored.
20 Educational suitability assessment is designed
21 to measure the suitability of the building in regards to
22 how well it supports the educational programs that are
23 being done in that building.
24 That assessment is done by using a standard
25 questionnaire and asking these questions to the school
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1 site administrator. Typically it is the principal. And
2 the questions include items such as are all the types of
3 spaces present in the building that are needed to support
4 the program that's being offered in that building, are the
5 classrooms configured in size appropriately and those
6 kinds of issues.
7 And the assessment is -- all the questions are
8 weighted and then you get a suitability score for that
9 school as a whole.
10 The technology readiness assessment looks at the
11 existence of infrastructure in the school to support
12 information technology. That assessment asks questions
13 such as is there sufficient infrastructure to support
14 computers in the classrooms? Does the district or the
15 school have a wide area network or local area network? So
16 it is not looking at what actually is in the classroom but
17 what the infrastructure is in the school.
18 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair, may we ask
19 questions as we go?
20 COCHAIR DEVIN: If that wouldn't be
21 disruptive to you, I think that would be good.
22 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair, Dodds, now
23 you're on the technology capability of the structure and
24 that's in the scoring system also.
25 Can a building that is structurally sound, in
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1 good shape end up with an unsatisfactory score because of
2 its technical ability that potentially could be remedied
3 but we end up with an overall building score because of,
4 for example, technology and maybe some other things?
5 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, the three
6 assessments -- condition assessment, suitability and
7 technology -- the scores are separate. And in some
8 regards they're not interreactive or relate to each other.
9 So you might have a building that has a great condition
10 score but a very poor technology readiness score or vice
11 versa, any combination of the three.
12 Does that answer your question?
13 COCHAIR DEVIN: Do you need to clarify?
14 SENATOR CATHCART: It does. I guess I
15 just -- to follow up a little bit, then, on structural,
16 for example, a bad roof or bad boiler, does that put
17 the -- something that can be remedied, does that put the
18 overall score down to the level where we recommend
19 replacement?
20 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, perhaps it
21 would be good to go through the condition assessment
22 scoring system and I think that might answer your
23 question.
24 COCHAIR DEVIN: I think it might because
25 this committee is really struggling with that and I --
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1 well, I think all parties working with this are struggling
2 with this. I don't think it is just the committee. And
3 our frustration is, okay, how can we tell from this score
4 when we are in the situation that we have the need of a
5 new building versus we have the need to go in and fix
6 something, or it is a perfectly functional, physically
7 safe building but we need something on the technology
8 infrastructure?
9 It is difficult to sort that out from our
10 understanding at this point, so maybe if you can add to
11 that, that will help us.
12 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, if I could do
13 that, I want to give a couple notes about the overall
14 picture where we are in the state today. As I said
15 earlier, '97-'98 we did a statewide assessment. Since
16 then we've been annually reassessing a quarter of the
17 state and so up to this point we've reassessed half the
18 state. In September we will begin assessing another
19 quarter. So mid-October we will have completed
20 reassessment of three-quarters of the state. And then
21 within the next year we will do the last quarter, so that
22 these condition and suitability and technology scores will
23 be updated.
24 And since the original assessment we've added
25 two more elements to our assessment, and that is an
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1 accounting of the number of teaching spaces in each school
2 and a visual confirmation of the gross square footage in
3 each school.
4 And all that data is in the database which the
5 Department of Ed has at its use.
6 COCHAIR DEVIN: Okay, now a question on
7 that. You had said that the educational suitability is
8 determined by questions that the superintendent answers.
9 MR. CROMWELL: Correct. It is a
10 structured assessment.
11 COCHAIR DEVIN: The technology readiness
12 is the assessment of the existence of infrastructure. Who
13 determines that and who does that assessment?
14 MR. CROMWELL: On the first assessment we
15 used all architectural firms from in state, and in the
16 consequent two assessments we've been using architects or
17 engineers from out of state. They're trained in the
18 assessment and then they ask those questions of typically
19 the principal, or in the case of the condition, it might
20 be a maintenance person.
21 So they -- those questions are asked to the
22 school representative who then reports the situation.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: And is that on the
24 physical condition and the technology piece?
25 MR. CROMWELL: The physical condition --
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1 let me go -- the suitability and the technology
2 assessments are basically questions that are asked of that
3 school site administrator.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: So that's an administrator
5 for that?
6 MR. CROMWELL: The condition assessment
7 begins with the evaluator doing a walk-through of the
8 school. Typically they'll walk around the outside of the
9 school. Then they'll visit all of the spaces inside the
10 school, climb on the roof, look in the mechanical room and
11 make notes about what they see.
12 Then they will sit down and input that data into
13 a computer that has our BASYS software on it. And if you
14 will look at -- I think you have a chart that looks
15 something like that or is a piece of paper that has two
16 boxes on it. In the bottom box you will see the typical
17 structural systems that are evaluated.
18 The first column there, major system, is just
19 kind of a way to divide up the different systems.
20 The second column lists the specific systems
21 that are looked at. Some buildings would have all of
22 these systems and some buildings might not have all of
23 these systems. We do have a category for elevators,
24 another category for fixed equipment. In this example
25 this building didn't particularly have that.
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1 If you will look then up to the upper box, it
2 contains the definitions for good, fair, poor and
3 unsatisfactory -- in this case for a roof -- that the
4 evaluator uses to evaluate that system.
5 So, in other words, the evaluator is guided by
6 these definitions of what a good roof is or what a fair
7 roof is, not his personal opinion, his or her personal
8 opinion.
9 So in this case you will see that for like a
10 fair roof, we're saying that there's no apparent failure
11 evident, but there's minor repairable problems visible
12 such as loose or misplaced flashing, that kind of thing.
13 The evaluators are trained to use those
14 definitions to grade the roof so that ensures a level of
15 consistency among the evaluators and ensures what we mean
16 by a fair or poor or unsatisfactory roof in this case or
17 another system.
18 So you will see that in this example we have
19 here that the systems have been evaluated and some of them
20 are in good condition, some of them are fair, poor, so on.
21 Then the next column, it says "possible score."
22 These possible scores are based on that system's
23 contribution to the total cost of that building. See, for
24 instance, in this example the foundation structure
25 contributes 16 percent of the total cost of that building,
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1 exterior walls contribute 6 percent.
2 We've developed this model by looking at
3 standard cost estimating models from MPR, which is a
4 nationally known cost estimating company, for the typical
5 building that we're estimating.
6 Then the next column is the score that that
7 system received --
8 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Madam Chair, before
9 we leave that first column, I've added up the possible
10 scores and they don't come up to 98, they come up to 102.
11 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, you're
12 correct, Mr. Baker. ADA is the bottom category down
13 there. Because ADA accessibility to a building is such a
14 nonstandard issue, it might entail just putting a ramp to
15 a building, might entail having an elevator to a building,
16 might entail redoing all of the bathrooms.
17 It is not something easily calculated as to what
18 percent it contributes to the total cost of the building,
19 so the ADA score is not included in that building's
20 condition score. It is taken out because it is just too
21 hard to fit in the model.
22 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: That comes up to 98
23 then.
24 MR. CROMWELL: It is not beyond me, I
25 could have had a math error, too.
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1 Madam Chair, to continue, then, the score that
2 the system receives, as you can see, if it is a good
3 system, it will get 100 percent of the possible points.
4 If it is fair, poor, unsatisfactory, it gets a percentage
5 based on the weighting.
6 Then each system gets a score percent which is
7 simply arrived at by dividing the score by the possible
8 score, and then the building then gets a -- at the bottom
9 you see the building has a total possible score, which may
10 or may not be 10 depending on the systems in that
11 building. It gets a point score and then you take the
12 score divided by the possible score and you get a percent
13 score.
14 So, based on the fact that that score is built
15 up by looking at how each system contributes to the total
16 cost of that building, that percent score essentially
17 represents the percent of value in that building that's in
18 good condition.
19 COCHAIR DEVIN: Now, I want to stop there
20 because I think there's two perceptions I want to clear
21 up, and when -- and I want to understand -- be sure we
22 understand what you said.
23 When you talk about a possible score and, let's
24 say -- let's just pick out a roof, and you give it a
25 certain score over in the third column, or even the second
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1 column, that score is directly related to the percent of
2 cost of that item to that total building.
3 So when you're all done, what these scores
4 reflect to a large part is the percent of cost of that
5 building that is in good condition, poor condition, fair
6 condition, you know. Because I think the perception
7 floating out there among many of us who are not
8 professionals in this particular construction field and
9 the lay public is that that score represents an issue
10 of -- and it may or may not, but it can't be directly
11 interpreted to say that that score represents an issue
12 then of safety. It represents an issue of cost of that
13 particular item to the building.
14 So, in other words, if the roof is about to fall
15 in on people, that is a different issue than interest if
16 the roof constitutes 20 percent of the costs of that
17 building and it has some leaks and they need to be
18 repaired.
19 I mean, to a professional who sees the building
20 as a structure, it may be one thing. To a parent I'm
21 trying to get our perceptions clear what that score really
22 represents. It tells us the percent of that building
23 costwise that is in good condition, fair condition, poor
24 condition, is that -- in pure construction issues, but it
25 doesn't necessarily translate across the board that that's
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1 an issue of pure safety.
2 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, it is a
3 combination of those, actually. Because if you have, for
4 instance -- you're absolutely correct that that score
5 represents assessment of the value of that building that
6 is in good condition.
7 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: I'm sorry, what
8 did you say at the end?
9 MR. CROMWELL: She's correct in saying
10 that score represents the percent, the value of that
11 building that's in good condition. But if --
12 COCHAIR DEVIN: Cost.
13 SENATOR MASSIE: Value or cost?
14 COCHAIR DEVIN: Ask your question, Mike.
15 That's okay.
16 Senator Massie was asking for a clarification.
17 SENATOR MASSIE: Madam Chair, thank you.
18 Sorry for interrupting. You're saying one thing and he's
19 saying another and it is two different concepts.
20 Madam Chair, what I hear you saying is
21 percentage of costs and I hear Mr. -- Dodds saying
22 percentage of value. Those are two different concepts, so
23 perhaps this would be a point to talk about that. Or are
24 they the same or are we talking two different things here?
25 MR. CROMWELL: Well, yes, I mean, you
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1 could define those -- Madam Chair, you could define those
2 differently. What we're saying is that the value based on
3 the cost of building that building is what that number
4 represents, that that percent is in good condition.
5 However, if you had a building that scored zero
6 on foundation structure, the definition of that zero or
7 unsatisfactory condition is that it is an unsafe building
8 and immediate attention needs to be brought to the owner
9 of that building.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: So am I correct in saying
11 it makes a difference what brings the score down on the
12 level of safety?
13 MR. CROMWELL: Absolutely. You will see
14 down in the bottom categories, safety-building code where
15 we evaluate means of exiting, fire control capability,
16 fire alarm system. Those systems are evaluated by asking
17 a series of multiple questions about what is in existence
18 in that building.
19 So you may have an unsatisfactory down there,
20 which is a -- could be construed as an unsafe situation
21 given a fire or other emergency, but because the cost of
22 those systems is not huge, it doesn't lower the score
23 considerably.
24 If I can go one step further, because this is
25 the important part, I think, because that score represents
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1 the value or the percent of that building that's in good
2 condition, if you subtract that percent score from 100
3 percent, in this case it would be 33 percent or something,
4 that represents the value of that -- the cost of that
5 building that needs to be invested back into that building
6 to bring it up to a score of 100, or good condition.
7 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Massie.
8 SENATOR MASSIE: Madam Chair, thank you.
9 That's an important point, Mr. Dodds. Am I getting that
10 right -- Mr. Cromwell?
11 MR. CROMWELL: That's all right.
12 SENATOR MASSIE: I'm sorry, I'm on coffee
13 this morning.
14 MR. CROMWELL: I've been accused of having
15 two last names.
16 SENATOR MASSIE: Indeed, the State should
17 be charged with maintaining the buildings in as good a
18 shape as possible. In the long run that's in the best
19 economic interest of the state. The Supreme Court in the
20 last two decisions has emphasized that the State has a
21 responsibility to maintain safe and efficient buildings to
22 deliver its constitutional basket of educational goods and
23 services, you know, and the reverse of that meaning that
24 if a building is not efficient and not safe, that it
25 affects the quality of education.
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1 Now, Mr. Cromwell, how does that standard
2 interrelate to this particular assessment score?
3 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
5 MR. CROMWELL: I think that you have to
6 look at, as you suggested, the condition of that building
7 and the specific systems that are in need of repair. You
8 also have to look at the educational suitability of that
9 building as to whether or not it is supporting the
10 educational programs to understand whether or not it is
11 still, you know -- whether or not it is supporting the
12 basket of goods.
13 I think obviously that if you had a building --
14 let's just take an example. Let's say we've got a roof
15 that's completely failed. Everything else in that
16 building is perfect. You know that's not going to happen.
17 Typically that building would score something like 94.
18 Obviously that building is not suitable if you haven't got
19 a roof that's satisfactory.
20 So I think you have to look at the score and the
21 condition of that building and the systems and also the
22 educational suitability. You can have a bus barn that
23 scores 100. Is that an educationally suitable building?
24 No, obviously not.
25 So I think it is an issue that you have to look
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1 beyond just the bottom line score. Does that answer your
2 question?
3 SENATOR MASSIE: Madam Chair, as a
4 follow-up, then, then we really simply can't pick out a
5 score and say we will fix everything below this score and
6 we don't need to fix anything above this score, that
7 indeed, we need to take a look at this not only the total
8 picture within the context of education, but subjectively
9 in many instances to be able to say this indeed is
10 affecting our ability to deliver that educational basket?
11 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, what we've
12 suggested in the past in discussions on this issue is that
13 a condition score could be a way to prioritize and it
14 could be a triggering mechanism, but probably it should
15 not be the end-all answer that Senator Massie is
16 suggesting. One needs to look beyond just one score.
17 COCHAIR DEVIN: So a total score is --
18 we're going to have to look at something that when you get
19 in and you have a low score and you have a score that
20 appears questionable, we have to go beyond that low score
21 and look at what constituted the makeup of that score in
22 determining -- for example, in reviewing states, when we
23 start to look at priorities or look at the real essence of
24 that need, we've got to go beyond just that total score?
25 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, I would agree
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1 with that.
2 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Cathcart.
3 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair, I guess
4 that's getting exactly what my second question was a while
5 ago. We could have, for example, a 30-year-old building
6 in fairly decent condition, has a bad roof, heating system
7 is -- needs replaced, but those two things, when you have
8 a 30-year-old building in fairly good condition for its
9 age, two serious things, can bring the score down to
10 indicate total replacement of the whole school? It could
11 do that? It could get the points down where it looks like
12 we need to replace the whole school rather than address a
13 new heating system and a roof?
14 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, I think that's
15 a key issue. And I don't have an answer for you today.
16 But when do you replace a building as opposed to repairing
17 it? And again, I would suggest that that is not -- would
18 not be based on one score, it would be based on looking at
19 how that building is supporting the educational program.
20 And if that building for a number of reasons -- classroom
21 size, classroom configuration, technology
22 infrastructure -- all of those things are not supporting
23 the educational program, that may be the key.
24 But I don't think it is a simple one score
25 answers all questions.
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1 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Baker and
2 then Representative Simpson.
3 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Thank you, Madam
4 Chair.
5 Let's first define something here. Your BASYS
6 score condition assessment sheet, the score is the one
7 that's at the bottom -- let's say for -- I happen to be
8 Crook County, that score is an accumulation of the score
9 percent or the score column?
10 When you look at your sheet, is that the score
11 percent or the score column?
12 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, I'm not sure,
13 when you look at Crook County, you're looking at the
14 scores in the report?
15 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Yes.
16 MR. CROMWELL: And the scores in the
17 report are the score percent.
18 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Score percent?
19 Okay, I need to know for sure what we're talking about.
20 Second question, which I think is more
21 important, is what would you recommend the determination
22 point to be, whether replacement -- where does the
23 expertise lie in replacement versus fix? Or should that
24 lie in -- should it lie with consulting? Should it lie
25 with committee? Where in the process -- with special
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1 expertise hired by the department? Where should that
2 decision point be?
3 And the reason I'm getting at this is we're
4 seeing something occurring, let's say Fremont, a decision
5 has been made apparently somewhere or assumed to be made
6 that a building will be replaced when in fact some of that
7 building rates at an 85.
8 And as we move forward, that assumption grows
9 and grows into, "We have to have a new building." And a
10 decision really has never been made, at least at this
11 level, that it absolutely has to be done and yet it seems
12 to be occurring. The snowball began to roll.
13 Where should that decision point be made? Would
14 you have an opinion?
15 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, my opinion
16 would be that the guidelines need to be established that
17 would define guidelines or questions that need to be
18 answered about a building as to whether it should be
19 replaced. And those guidelines should be based on
20 architectural engineering issues and they should be based
21 on educational suitability issues. And there probably
22 should be guidelines or expectations on -- established on
23 how long we expect our buildings to last, and
24 accessibility would be another issue in there.
25 So I think you would develop guidelines with the
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1 input of professional educators, professional architects,
2 engineers that would then guide a body which is reviewing
3 grant requests as to whether or not a building should be
4 replaced or be renovated.
5 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: So you're
6 recommending a process be developed first with legal
7 expertise, structural expertise, all of those kinds of
8 things? You're recommending the process rather than any
9 individual point as a decision point? The process needs
10 to go forward and then every building is assessed
11 according to the process? Is that what I'm hearing you
12 say?
13 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, I believe --
14 I'm recommending that some guidelines be established that
15 would guide a review of a request to replace or renovate.
16 And those guidelines should reflect architectural,
17 structural issues, reflect educational issues, obviously,
18 that would have input from those professions so that when
19 the State identifies a building that needs dollars for
20 repair or maintenance or replacement, then there's some
21 process that guides, some guidelines that guide the State
22 in making the decision as to what's the appropriate
23 approach in this instance.
24 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Thank you.
25 MR. CROMWELL: Does that answer your
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1 question?
2 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Yes.
3 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Simpson.
4 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Thank you, Madam
5 Chair.
6 Mr. Cromwell, I'm going to ask you some stupid
7 questions. The possible score is 100 percent or -- say 16
8 percent possible score, can you equate that to foundation
9 structure being 16 percent of the total cost of the
10 initial construction cost of the building?
11 MR. CROMWELL: Yes. Madam Chair --
12 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: And then the
13 score, what comes first, the rating or the score?
14 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, the evaluator
15 rates the system based on these definitions. The software
16 then automatically assigns a score for that rating. The
17 evaluator doesn't do that. That's built into the software
18 program.
19 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair,
20 Mr. Cromwell, then fair is 50 to 75 percent or just what
21 the low end of 50 percent or 75? Is it 75 percent
22 automatic?
23 MR. CROMWELL: No, Madam Chair, it varies
24 on the system, depending on the system. As you can see,
25 fair exterior walls is 56, fair exterior windows, doors is
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1 a 50 percent.
2 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair, so
3 that's built into the program?
4 MR. CROMWELL: Yes.
5 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: And you don't see
6 that on this sheet, the criteria that goes into the range
7 or the actual percentage within the range.
8 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, no, you don't
9 see that on this sheet. That's built into the program,
10 yes.
11 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: And what you're
12 talking about as a follow-up with Representative Baker,
13 clearly you want a process that guides whoever is in
14 the -- in need of knowledge about whether to replace or
15 repair a building, the process that takes you first to the
16 criteria or the guidelines to determine those issues as
17 clearly and quickly as possible.
18 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, yes.
19 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: And is Mr. Curry
20 going to address those issues more specifically?
21 Thank you, Madam Chair.
22 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
24 MR. CROMWELL: Mr. Curry is going to speak
25 about some of the governance issues, structures that he
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1 thinks are relevant to this whole issue. He will not be
2 speaking directly to the issue of the criteria whether to
3 replace or renovate buildings. He will talk about
4 process.
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Cathcart.
6 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair,
7 Mr. Cromwell, then in reality we could get a building
8 score of 68, which is pretty darned good, but there are
9 issues there that need immediate attention, while we could
10 have another building scoring 55 that overall is in good
11 shape and doesn't need immediate attention; is that
12 correct?
13 MR. CURRY: I would say it is.
14 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, my colleague
15 would say yes. Theoretically that's possible. I think,
16 you know, if you just play some games with the numbers
17 that you will probably see that would be difficult to
18 happen, but theoretically.
19 SENATOR CATHCART: Well, Madam Chair, if
20 you have a really fairly new school building and the whole
21 heating system goes out, the heating system isn't enough
22 to bring the score down to warrant immediate attention,
23 but the heating system needs to be attended to
24 immediately.
25 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, absolutely.
27
1 SENATOR CATHCART: That's the point I'm
2 making.
3 MR. CROMWELL: Absolutely.
4 SENATOR CATHCART: It needs immediate
5 attention but still has an overall high score.
6 SENATOR ANDERSON: Madam Chair.
7 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Anderson.
8 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you, Madam
9 Chair. I guess at the risk of oversimplifying, as I look
10 at composite scores, each piece of the composite in effect
11 has a weight. The weight seems to me to be being thrown
12 to the dollar value rather than a value of health/safety.
13 In other words, as I look at top of this,
14 foundation carries a substantial weight of 16, and I look
15 at some of the health safety issues in terms of fire codes
16 and exits, they're in the area of 2. So in order for any
17 judgments to be made in regard to dollar value, that is
18 more the way this instrument works in terms of dollar
19 value more than it would be as a parent of a kindergarten
20 child looking at it with health/safety concerns.
21 Is that a correct assumption that it is weighted
22 more, designed more to get at dollar values more than
23 values of health/safety, that health/safety values would
24 have to be determined by someone else in interpreting
25 this?
28
1 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, the senator is
2 correct. Obviously if you had a building that the only
3 deficiency in it was that it didn't have a fire alarm
4 system, it would score 98 percent or something like that;
5 however, I would be very concerned about a building that
6 didn't have a fire alarm system.
7 There's also issues today, a lot of
8 health/safety issues from asbestos to indoor air quality
9 that affect the health and safety of our children. So the
10 senator is correct.
11 COCHAIR DEVIN: And I think that is
12 something that I was trying to get clarity on that
13 earlier, which you did a very good job of describing that.
14 That is something that is very misunderstood about this
15 score by not only the public but, I think, legislators and
16 people working with it.
17 So it really is good to have this discussion,
18 that, you know, the score gives you a ballpark that says
19 you need to look, but you've got to look well beyond that
20 score to tell what you're really dealing with and some
21 sort of a process to do that.
22 SENATOR ANDERSON: As a means of comment
23 on that, so then this instrument in that essence is
24 totally objective, so if you have to put a subjective
25 value to it, it would be to a group of experts or whatever
29
1 to determine this needs to move forward in safety rather
2 than just mechanical. So in that essence this is totally
3 objective.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: Well, and I guess from
5 that question, I've had one from that part, as you know.
6 I think if you're doing a roof, as you give an example of
7 here, you've certainly got a piece. When you come to the
8 educational suitability and the technology readiness and
9 the questionnaires that are filled out by the district,
10 how one of our charges is that we've got uniformity and
11 equal opportunity.
12 We all get more questionnaires than we care to
13 think about being asked to be filled out and, you know,
14 there's a certain amount of subjectivity in that, in those
15 questionnaires and how you answer them. They're not
16 always black and white answers, and any of you who have
17 had a phone interview know that.
18 How much subjectivity have we got in the
19 educational suitability and the technology readiness that
20 gets combined with this major systems score to give a
21 building more of a total score and where are we on that
22 piece?
23 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, I think that's
24 a very good question. On the technology readiness
25 assessment, the only subjectivity that would come into
30
1 that assessment would be if somebody is misrepresenting
2 what's in that building. Either you do have a local area
3 network or you don't.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: It is more like an
5 inventory?
6 MR. CROMWELL: Exactly. Either you have a
7 satellite hookup or you don't. Either you have cable TV
8 ability or you don't. That's a very, I think, objective
9 assessment.
10 On the educational suitability assessment,
11 there's been some -- I understand quite naturally there's
12 been some misunderstanding about how that assessment is
13 done.
14 That assessment, as I said before, is a
15 structured questionnaire that is administered to typically
16 the principal after the evaluator has toured the building
17 and seen the classrooms, seen the science labs, has looked
18 at the auditorium, looked at all of the spaces and then
19 sits down with the administrator and goes through this
20 series of questions.
21 So while the administrator has his professional
22 opinion about whether that building is suitable, the
23 evaluator is also trained to balance that to some degree.
24 I will give you an example that I use a lot.
25 This is not untypical. We were doing a training session
31
1 in another state at one point and we went to a school, we
2 toured the school, we sat down with the principal and went
3 through the educational suitability.
4 We got to the point of saying -- and we looked
5 at all of the different types of classrooms. And we said,
6 "How suitable is your music room?" And the administrator
7 said, "Oh, we have a great music program. Our music
8 teacher is just fantastic." And went on and on and on.
9 But the truth of the matter was, and we had seen
10 this, was that the music program was being carried out in
11 a leftover storage room. The program might have had great
12 people working with it, but the room was not suitable for
13 that program.
14 Our evaluators are trained to apply as objective
15 analysis as possible. I will not deny that there is some
16 subjectivity -- I can't say it but there is some there in
17 the assessment, depending on one's opinion as to what the
18 educational program needs to be supported. And I think
19 that could become more objective if we establish
20 guidelines for what constituted a facility that did
21 support educational programs in the basket of goods.
22 Does that --
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: That's helpful. It was
24 not my total understanding up to that point that the
25 evaluator actually sat down with the superintendent or the
32
1 administrator and did this piece, so that is helpful.
2 MR. CROMWELL: It has been said that the
3 suitability is self-reported. It is not self-reported.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Simpson.
5 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair,
6 Mr. Cromwell, the assessment scoring sheet that we have
7 looks to me to identify general criteria that's used by
8 the evaluator of good, fair, poor and unsatisfactory to
9 arrive at an initial rating and then more information is
10 fed to the software to arrive at the score.
11 How -- what are the criteria within the software
12 itself that the software uses to evaluate what the score
13 should be? I mean, how lengthy is that? How many
14 questions does it ask? Is that information that we can
15 look at to see what type of criteria the software uses to
16 arrive at the score?
17 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, the software
18 applies a number to that good, fair, poor, and that's
19 programmed into the software. It is not -- the software
20 is not doing some kind of calculation or review of
21 questions. It is just structured into the program.
22 The example I've given here applies to the
23 structural systems, the top systems.
24 When we get down to the mechanical systems and
25 the safety building code systems, the program uses a
33
1 multiple -- multiple questions to arrive at the
2 assessment. And the questions are weighted depending on
3 their importance. For instance, in the HVAC system that
4 had a steam boiler there would be questions about was that
5 boiler in good condition, were the tubes rusted, was the
6 insulation in place, were the controls in place and so on
7 and so forth.
8 But the questions have been weighted and the
9 scoring system is all set inside of the program. We could
10 in great detail go over that scoring system if the
11 committee would like. I'm not ready to do that at this
12 point, but I could at some point if that would be helpful.
13 COCHAIR DEVIN: So if your evaluator comes
14 to a complex system, he would have a number of questions
15 to answer on that system that would then go into the
16 software and be dealt with by the software.
17 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, yes, there's
18 standard set questions and the questions are weighted and
19 whether they're answered yes or no or agree, disagree,
20 nonapplicable, that goes into the score of that system.
21 COCHAIR DEVIN: In order to try to boil
22 this down a little bit?
23 MR. CROMWELL: Yes.
24 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair,
25 Mr. Cromwell, is this software created by MGT or is this
34
1 software available to the general public? Could it be
2 available to the State or to districts to do those
3 evaluations on a regular or annual basis?
4 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, it is MGT's
5 software that we developed approximately eight or ten
6 years ago. We have to this point not sold the software;
7 however, the State does have the software in its database.
8 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Baker.
9 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Thank you, Madam
10 Chair. The BASYS conditions assessment scoring sheet here
11 shows that the HVAC and forced air heat has a condition of
12 4 and it gives -- the software gave it a score of 3
13 because of that condition is poor. Is that absolute? In
14 other words, the questions as Representative Simpson asked
15 them led me to believe that there were more detailed
16 information besides -- and more options than a 3 or a 6 or
17 a 10 or a zero. Is the software set up to give just a 3,
18 6, 10 or zero?
19 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, that's
20 correct.
21 MR. CURRY: Dodds, no.
22 MR. CROMWELL: My colleague was involved
23 in creating the software.
24 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mr. Curry.
25 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, Representative
35
1 Baker, one of the things that is an attribute here is the
2 ability to break down these systems into components, so
3 that in one wing of the building you might have one type
4 of heating system and you might have another type of
5 heating system in the other. They might both be forced
6 air, but have different points of origination of the heat.
7 The evaluator will break those down in terms of
8 the proportion of the total building. The computer
9 will -- and then we'll go through a lengthy list of
10 questions on each. So the ultimate result in a
11 multi-component system could be a score of 3.52 or 4.26,
12 depending upon the contribution and the condition of each
13 of the two or more systems to the total heating system of
14 the building.
15 All of that is down in the bowels, if you will,
16 of the software. Originally we did it by paper and pencil
17 so you would have the mounds and mounds of paper which was
18 the reason to put that into the computer system.
19 So if you have a single system, to answer your
20 question, for the building, the answer that my colleague
21 gave is quite correct. The score would be 3 in that
22 instance.
23 But if you had multiple systems of that nature,
24 the score could be 2.5, 3.7 or a variety of things.
25 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, if I can just
36
1 elaborate on that a little bit, the example we often see
2 in the field is we'll have a building that has a roof,
3 maybe two different areas, and part of that roof has been
4 reroofed recently and is in good condition and the other
5 part is older and hasn't been replaced and is in poor
6 condition.
7 So what we do is we assign a percent to each one
8 of those roofs. We divide the roof system into two
9 components. The good roof, say, is 40 percent of the
10 building -- 40 percent of the roof and the poor roof which
11 is 60 percent and then those calculations go in to make
12 that score that Mr. Curry just referred to.
13 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Baker.
14 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: If I may, Madam
15 Chair. Within the decision of the evaluator on each of
16 those components, whether it is the 40, 60, whatever
17 percentage that might be, the options are only four --
18 good, fair, poor, unsatisfactory? There's nothing that
19 goes into between? In other words, you wouldn't have
20 something between fair and poor? You would choose one or
21 the other?
22 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, that's
23 correct.
24 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Massie.
25 SENATOR MASSIE: Madam Chair, based on the
37
1 discussion we've been having it seems incumbent on the
2 State to add another dimension to the scoring system and
3 that would be a dimension of the evaluator being able to
4 select certain conditions that affect the delivery of the
5 basket to bring it to the attention of the State since the
6 State has responsibility of ensuring a safe and efficient
7 building.
8 So, in other words, if a score gets a 74 but
9 those 26 points which are deducted are in an area that
10 significantly compromises the school's ability to deliver
11 that basket, that needs to be brought to the attention of
12 the other people in the process.
13 If a building score gets one of 51 but those
14 deductions are in an area that doesn't necessarily affect
15 the ability to deliver that basket, then that should also
16 be noted.
17 In other words, I think that this is a good
18 system but we need to add another dimension to take into
19 account the safe and efficient delivery of the basket that
20 the Supreme Court has identified as well.
21 COCHAIR DEVIN: Okay. Now, do you have
22 more to your report, Mr. Cromwell, or --
23 MR. CROMWELL: No, just answer any other
24 questions.
25 COCHAIR DEVIN: Okay. Then I have another
38
1 question as we come back to this piece that I think is
2 giving us a lot of difficulty between the public
3 perception and the instrument we're working with now. In
4 every other aspect of our society and educational systems
5 we're dealing with criticisms of the superlatives, in
6 other words, the grade inflation that is talked about, our
7 committee deals with problems with secondary institutions
8 telling us we've got grade inflation in comparison to
9 other scores, we've got some grade inflation. We've got a
10 lot of what used to be a C is now a B or so forth.
11 And it seems your system may be very
12 professional and objective, but it is almost the direct
13 opposite of that. You can't get an excellent and we're so
14 used to dealing with criticisms that we're handing out too
15 much of the superlative.
16 When you come to this case and you have good,
17 fair and poor and we have examples of schools that are
18 brand-new that get 90-something but not 100 percent,
19 people don't understand that. And it might be a very good
20 professional instrument, but in the educational field it
21 is running exactly opposite of the tide.
22 And it runs exactly opposite of what we're
23 struggling with to bring accountability to the system and
24 have meaningful education that's meaningfully represented
25 by the grades that students are given and so forth. And I
39
1 think the entire system -- I don't want to point fingers.
2 I think teachers are struggling with this. I think
3 parents and businesses and the committee deals with it.
4 But that's what we hear. And it appears that
5 this system has been kept very much in the scientific,
6 professional, what we might call old style, and, in fact,
7 doesn't transcend what has happened out here.
8 And then parents come together dealing with one
9 set of circumstances and -- when I graduated there was one
10 valedictorian. Now there may be 14, 15, you know. So
11 we've seen changes, but it is a real collision when we try
12 to explain this to the public.
13 Do you have any perception of that or any
14 thoughts or comments you want to add? Because we need to
15 not only have a workable system, we need to have an
16 understanding of it and how it is functioning.
17 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, thank you.
18 That was a compliment to us because we like to think of
19 our system as professional and objective, but I understand
20 the dilemma.
21 But in reviewing some of the projects that are
22 being -- requesting grants now, we are using additional
23 assessments that I think may be of interest to the
24 committee.
25 And these are obviously projects that haven't
40
1 been built yet. We're doing a value review, engineering
2 review, safety and security review, so we're coming at
3 this question of what kind of institution or what kind of
4 building this is from several different angles, and so I
5 think there are approaches that can be developed to answer
6 those kinds of questions.
7 MGT has been doing school district management
8 reviews for about ten years now and part of that review
9 has always been to look at safety and security issues in
10 schools. So we've developed from that experience and
11 research -- we've developed an assessment that we're
12 applying to these new projects of safety and security and
13 the design of that building.
14 Certainly that would be something I would think
15 parents and educators would be concerned about as to
16 whether a school building was excellent and well designed.
17 Obviously energy efficiency is a big issue these days, and
18 I'm sure there's other ones that could be looked at. I
19 agree with your assessment.
20 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, if I can add,
21 we've tried to avoid the use of superlatives. If you have
22 a building that scores very high on educational
23 suitability, technology readiness, it is fully accessible,
24 it has only minor problems, you could probably call that
25 an excellent school because it covers all of those things.
41
1 We have just not wanted to go into fine tuning
2 what is the difference between outstanding and excellent.
3 And we've said if it meets these things it is a good
4 building and a good building to us is that's what one
5 should strive to have, is good buildings and that supports
6 positive education.
7 COCHAIR DEVIN: Are there other questions
8 of Mr. Cromwell?
9 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
11 SENATOR CATHCART: So tell me, an overall
12 score of 75, would that be a good building?
13 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, in our overall
14 report we have some general --
15 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mary, are you after a copy
16 of that?
17 MS. BYRNE; I am, yes.
18 COCHAIR DEVIN: That would be helpful.
19 MR. CURRY: General rules of thumb, I
20 can't remember exactly where a 75 would fall. I think it
21 would probably fall in the fair range.
22 COCHAIR DEVIN: Actually, 75 -- I think my
23 cochair has that.
24 COCHAIR SHIVLER: 75 to 89 is good,
25 defined as good condition with some problems requiring
42
1 repair and renovation funds.
2 SENATOR CATHCART: Thank you.
3 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Actually, you know, how
4 you've outlined this is very good. The problem -- Madam
5 Chair, may I speak?
6 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
7 COCHAIR SHIVLER: The problem we're
8 running into is folks see fair or poor, which is replace
9 it, when, in fact, as you've defined fair as some problems
10 which may need attention and some problems that need
11 prompt attention. When you say fair, the public says
12 replace the building.
13 When you get down to poor, in fact poor is poor
14 conditions with numerous problems requiring prompt
15 attention and to save the building from further
16 deterioration. And we don't really get to replacement of
17 the thing until we get to 30 which is below satisfactory.
18 And I think how you've labeled these is a little
19 misconstruing to the public what we're trying to say.
20 Because fair to most people means let's get rid of it
21 when, in fact, fair and poor according to this is
22 something we should take care of fairly quickly.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: And I think, too, again
24 this brings us back to what we were talking about before.
25 Even the number scores here are something so different
43
1 than what we're used to when you look at any other piece
2 of education because we don't look at scores as low as 30
3 which is where we need to begin to look at total
4 replacement anyplace else in education.
5 And so, you know, it is a whole shift in
6 thinking in terms of where we're -- we need to be. And it
7 is a shift in thinking, I think, for anybody who tries to
8 handle the system. Not that it isn't a perfectly valid
9 system, but it is really hard to get into that mindset.
10 It is just very different.
11 Senator Anderson.
12 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you, Madam
13 Chair. What we're trying to do is maybe on the basis of
14 public perception. We have to do so much education in
15 order for people to understand, the point being here that
16 many times we make the assumptions if my child goes to an
17 average -- to a fair building that they're getting a fair
18 education and that's not necessarily the same.
19 If I were to have the choice of having a poor
20 building and a good teacher or a good building and a poor
21 teacher, the choice is obvious. So we have to then be
22 able to get people to look at these things for what they
23 are.
24 The point I'm trying to make here quickly,
25 having spent most of my life in a profession where the
44
1 debate was quite often as to whether it was an art or
2 science, and I finish that by saying it was a bit of both,
3 and I think what we've got here is some pretty good
4 science in regard to how to deliver that.
5 I think the challenge then comes to the
6 committee is to what degree and how do we provide the art
7 to deliver this, if in fact this is an instrument, where
8 are we going to get the artist that's going to provide
9 this in fair and understandable facts.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Baker.
11 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Thank you, Madam
12 Chair. The next question as I'm looking at -- mine is
13 white, but as you look back at the building lists that go
14 on that apparently the Court has used to determine above
15 this, you know, this has to be fixed, I see a number of
16 buildings in here, particularly those in the lower scoring
17 positions, they're unused for educational purposes, a
18 significant number of buildings that may be used by only
19 one or two persons, one or two children, those kinds of
20 things. That evaluation needs to come into play by this
21 committee as to the usage of those.
22 As I look at particularly those two sheets, the
23 ones that I know about, this gets us clear into the
24 mid-50s. I would say that approximately 30 to 40 percent
25 of those buildings are not used for educational purposes
45
1 at this time or very, very limited for educational
2 purposes. I'll say one that's in my school district is
3 the Hyattville Elementary that the Court assigned a dollar
4 value of somewhere near, I think, 1.8 or 1.9 million to
5 fix it, and last time I knew, there were two elementary
6 students in that building.
7 You know, those kinds of evaluations, we have to
8 be aware that just because there's a score here doesn't
9 mean that we have to spend X dollars on fixing that
10 because of some issue that may be brought up.
11 And I think we have to evaluate the current use
12 of that building. Jeffrey City Elementary School, you
13 know, unused, has been unused for a number of years.
14 The Linch gym, you know, those kinds of things
15 you have to realize, at least a significant number,
16 probably by far the majority of those on the first page
17 are unused for educational purposes to any extent, any
18 large extent.
19 It is interesting that the Shoshoni-Lysite
20 school is even listed here. The community thinks of it as
21 their gathering place. There hasn't been a school in
22 there since -- well, Representative Phelps attended there
23 through the first few grades and they closed it down, I
24 think, when he was like in third or fourth grade. That
25 gives you an idea. I'm not going to tell you how old he
46
1 is. He's older than I am.
2 COCHAIR DEVIN: I guess that is a
3 frustration we do have here because there are examples.
4 In the past month I've had brought to my attention -- and
5 I wonder if the instrument does address it, but a couple
6 of educators brought to my attention their frustration
7 over the fact that their district actually had in two
8 areas storage rooms, an old gym was an unused storage area
9 and another area was unused and had been used for storage
10 for years.
11 When the evaluator came around, they cleaned it
12 out, moved the stuff elsewhere and said, "Look what awful
13 condition this gym is in and this training facility over
14 here for a weight room is in equally poor condition."
15 And, you know, it was evaluated based on -- is there
16 anything in the instrument to prevent that because their
17 concern, frankly, was our classrooms need things. We need
18 not to be fixing up storage rooms when we've got adequate
19 gym facilities.
20 Does anything say this district already has a
21 gym, a second gym is not -- a second or third or fourth
22 gym isn't needed? This was not a gym in use. Does
23 anything in the instrument tell us whether this could be
24 more than an isolated incident and we are, in fact,
25 perhaps not meeting the most immediate needs, which was
47
1 their concern and it would be my concern?
2 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, the condition
3 assessment is not going to tell whether another gym is
4 needed. It is assessing the condition of the buildings
5 that are there. It does assess -- to address
6 Representative Baker, it does address buildings not used
7 for educational purposes. It addresses every building it
8 owns.
9 COCHAIR DEVIN: If the district retains
10 ownership, it is addressed as a --
11 MR. CROMWELL: It is addressed by
12 numbering which buildings are used for educational
13 purposes and which aren't. The Department of Ed has an
14 ability to do a query on the database to pull up all the
15 educational versus noneducational buildings.
16 COCHAIR DEVIN: Part of our challenge, if
17 there were two students, if there might be another option
18 for those two students that was reasonable. It doesn't
19 tell us that, either, that they can go ten miles down the
20 road.
21 MR. CROMWELL: It is not measuring
22 utilization capacity.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: Or they could move in a
24 trailer and get rid of that.
25 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, this underscores
48
1 the real need for a process that as this plays out -- that
2 this particular instrument or these instruments that my
3 colleague has described, they provide information and that
4 information needs to feed into a process that will allow
5 the examination of those kinds of alternatives, fixes a
6 particular highly needed thing regardless of the score of
7 the building, makes sure that the fire alarm is in,
8 examining alternatives of saying is it possible to educate
9 those two students at another location or through another
10 means, things like that, as opposed to just blindly going
11 by the numbers that are here. These numbers are
12 indicators for attention and need to be fed into a
13 process, in my opinion.
14 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Shivler.
15 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chair, I think
16 what we asked these folks to do they did. They
17 inventoried the buildings and I believe in the future --
18 and I believe you're going to talk about this in the next
19 session, I think what we need to do now is have the
20 districts and the State go back on this inventory and
21 identify the needs of each district.
22 And a lot of the buildings now are superfluous,
23 they don't need to be there. We know that. And I think
24 in many cases that has come into the grading and I think
25 people see that, my gosh, a lot of our buildings are
49
1 falling down. Well, probably half of them should be torn
2 down because we don't need them and don't need to replace
3 them.
4 Now we have an inventory to identify what the
5 needs are, hopefully the State will have that information
6 and give us a better ability to determine what kind of
7 school we need to build and for how many people. This is
8 how I understand this. And I think that, you know, this
9 was simply an inventory and I think it was done well and
10 now we need to move on and determine what we need to do
11 with the inventory.
12 COCHAIR DEVIN: Well, Mr. Curry, I think
13 that's probably -- if there are no further questions, that
14 will lead into Mr. Curry's report -- we can certainly open
15 it for questions.
16 What Dave is circulating is actually a copy of
17 what some of us have and it was given to Joint
18 Appropriations, but I thought it might be helpful for all
19 of you to have a copy of some of what is available out
20 there when you look at a building to do some pieces on or
21 to do in the process. And it is called Overview of the
22 Review Process.
23 And a part of that, I think, will probably lead
24 into some of what Mr. Curry will be talking about.
25 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, I would like to
50
1 introduce my colleague, a former school superintendent, a
2 consultant with MGT and has participated in both the
3 reviews of the construction projects with Mr. Cromwell and
4 in formulating some of the suggested issues that the
5 committee might wish to address as it makes its way
6 through this perilous thicket that you've been going
7 through for a number of years in terms of meeting school
8 construction needs and adhering to court opinions and the
9 like.
10 What we have done under our contract to date is
11 to compile an update of school construction assistance
12 programs that has been made available to you. This is a
13 work in progress and it has now been sent back to the
14 states that have responded. We've got responses from all
15 but a few states and we're going to keep trying to get
16 responses from those that haven't. In some cases it has
17 been rather hard to pry the information out, but we have
18 done, I think, a pretty good job of compiling the
19 information.
20 We would like this to be considered as a
21 reference book that you might want to use. It is not
22 necessarily a statement that says you ought to do it like
23 state A, B, C or D, but there is information in there that
24 gives you data on how the different states -- those that
25 have provided school construction assistance to local
51
1 districts, how they operate.
2 It contains an overview and a background, a
3 summary of the overall patterns. Generally speaking,
4 there are two main ways of dealing with school
5 construction funding. One of them are general grants that
6 go out and then it provides a large amount of options to
7 local districts.
8 And most of the newer programs, particularly
9 those that have been in response to judicial decisions,
10 are project oriented and under those types of programs a
11 project -- requests are submitted and then funded under a
12 variety of terms under a variety of funding mechanisms,
13 matching schemes, so much of which is individually
14 determined by the particular state and the legal
15 environment within which the states are working.
16 Admittedly right now there's an element of
17 uncertainty as to the constraints that will face the state
18 of Wyoming until you hear more from the Supreme Court, and
19 I am certainly not the one to attempt to address how
20 they're going to come out on this, but there's a general
21 tone in the Supreme Court decisions to date that does
22 indicate a fairly large role for the state in identifying
23 and meeting school construction needs.
24 And to the extent that this document can be a
25 help in this process, then I think it will serve as useful
52
1 but I think it is secondary to you, the special committee,
2 addressing particular issues and attempting to form or
3 forge a consensus as to a direction you wish to go in
4 terms of the various aspects of how the process should
5 work and what organization at the state level should be
6 there to operate this process.
7 There's certain funding issues, but as you
8 indicated, Madam Chair, these are at least within the
9 purview of other committees. You may have some input into
10 those and certain of those have a bearing on some of the
11 collateral issues here.
12 A particular one is the issue of enhancements
13 and how and to what extent will enhancements be treated
14 and what are their long-term effect upon what standards
15 and guidelines are identified as necessary and appropriate
16 for school facilities in all of the districts at the
17 various grade levels.
18 I would like to say we're at your disposal in
19 terms of where you would like us to start in terms of the
20 issues that -- I believe you have the paper, two-page
21 paper saying suggested issues for the select cap con
22 committee, where you would like us to start in here.
23 We've attempted, with your assistance and with the
24 assistance of Cochair Shivler and actually Representative
25 Baker was present and had an opportunity to provide some
53
1 thoughts and suggestions at an earlier meeting, is to lay
2 out some issues and identify options that might be
3 followed kind of on a decision tree basis, if this, then
4 what, and what are the related aspects.
5 And it may well serve as the basis for disposing
6 of some of the questions so that we can then focus on and
7 do more research as needed to bring you back information.
8 COCHAIR DEVIN: Okay. And is that the
9 meeting in Lander and the conference call that we did --
10 MR. CURRY: That's correct.
11 COCHAIR DEVIN: -- and tried to identify
12 some of these? Okay.
13 I think unless the committee or the consultants
14 have a better suggestion, it might make sense to start
15 with number 2. Do you have your issues?
16 Senator Anderson.
17 SENATOR ANDERSON: Madam Chair, if we are,
18 in fact, going to start with number 2 in regard to
19 process, I have a question along those lines of process,
20 if I may.
21 COCHAIR DEVIN: Okay. And would you
22 rather -- I guess, committee, I would ask you, do you wish
23 to discuss funding structure first which might be not as
24 relevant to our consultants but would it be agreeable to
25 start with number 2, the process piece where they can
54
1 perhaps be the most help to us?
2 Your question.
3 SENATOR ANDERSON: Hopefully my question
4 relates to the process you've been involved with, but you
5 have been involved with both the studies, the original,
6 the one that we did with the assessment, the one that
7 you're going through now. Out of those we're going to get
8 two sets of information. We're going to get a pre-test
9 and kind of a post-test.
10 Is your company going to do anything in regard
11 to comparative analysis between what we've done with the
12 first study, what we've discovered with the second study,
13 and the third piece of that is in regard to the major
14 maintenance funds that have gone on in the meantime?
15 It is a great curiosity to me as regards the
16 parallels between the amount of major maintenance funds
17 that have gone in here in the meantime to see if there's a
18 significant correlation between the amount of money we put
19 through major maintenance, if in fact preventative
20 maintenance and as to how that plays out through this
21 second study.
22 If I make myself clear, not being a real good
23 engineer, I think it is something that I need to know that
24 those major maintenance funds have in fact made a
25 difference if and when and how they can be applied to make
55
1 a difference in the future and then some things we might
2 do in terms of construction that might provide for lower
3 costs through preventative maintenance down the road in
4 the future.
5 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, Senator Anderson,
6 I would also like to rely a bit on Dodds and Nelson in
7 responding to this, but we have that document that you've
8 been looking at and it has been updated and will be
9 updated for the entire state after two more.
10 I think it would absolutely be appropriate to
11 look at the issues that you're identifying and what has
12 been the effect of major maintenance funding and where has
13 it been spent and how is this reflected in the revised
14 scores, not only at the total level but in terms of the
15 particular components relating to health and safety and
16 the like.
17 In fact, one of the things in the -- at least in
18 the suggested process or an aspect that you might wish to
19 consider, and that is a careful linkage of the major
20 maintenance plans and the overall plans for the district,
21 should you incorporate a planning phase into the process.
22 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mr. Nelson.
23 MR. NELSON: Madam Chair, I would like to
24 add that last session you did take that step and require
25 districts to start assembling major maintenance plans over
56
1 a five-year period and constantly update that with
2 directives to the Department of Education to utilize that
3 information in its review process of construction needs as
4 well as investigating the impacts of major maintenance on
5 the overall conditions of buildings statewide. So you
6 have started down that road. We should be getting more
7 data as time goes on.
8 COCHAIR DEVIN: And I guess if we -- if
9 our consultants would see areas that we need to tighten
10 that piece, perhaps, and get it more meaningful, more to
11 the meaningful level Senator Anderson describes, I think
12 we would be very interested in knowing that.
13 And his discussion, I guess, then raises the
14 question in my mind if it might make more sense as our
15 staff listed that you review that, the scope of the review
16 process, that capital construction projects that Mary
17 handed out, to give us just maybe an overall picture.
18 They actually have that on the agenda next which would be,
19 as I understand it, more a scope -- is that the piece that
20 you had intended for the agenda, that scope of that review
21 process, what they're capable of bringing in terms of
22 professional consulting which might make more sense then
23 when we look at the elements of the system, how we plug
24 that?
25 MR. NELSON: Madam Chair, this was put
57
1 together for the expanded review, you're exactly right,
2 what they're doing for what we call the pipeline projects,
3 for those projects that were conditionally approved last
4 session by the legislature.
5 And we are contracting with MGT to perform this
6 expanded review for review by the Joint Appropriations
7 Committee when they consider their individual project
8 requests.
9 And I think Mr. Cromwell alluded to this as
10 giving you additional elements to look at when assessing a
11 particular building. So it does fit in. I think it is
12 germane to your discussion as to how you -- what kind of
13 review process you set up to analyze the adequacy of
14 buildings.
15 COCHAIR DEVIN: So then in the interests
16 of just getting ourselves background for tomorrow and
17 background for looking at the steps we need to put in the
18 process, would you like to walk through that and see if
19 the committee has any questions, but walk through what
20 you're doing in that overview review process, and it gives
21 us a picture of what kind of professional expertise we
22 would probably need to bring to the table in our design of
23 a process.
24 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, I would be
25 happy to. The review process is basically comprised of --
58
1 COCHAIR DEVIN: That's this sheet that was
2 handed out this morning.
3 MR. CROMWELL: Basically comprised of four
4 elements, the first one being a review of how the proposed
5 project complies or aligns with the State's guidelines, a
6 value engineering process assessment, an energy efficiency
7 assessment and a safety and security assessment.
8 The district by way of their architects prepares
9 a set of schematic design documents which is the first
10 step in going through preparing documents for
11 construction. And those documents define the project in
12 plan, size, elevation and show the site plan and show a
13 lot of detail, and then they also prepare written
14 documents that explain the major systems that are going to
15 go in the building, how it is going to be heated, how it
16 is going to be lighted, those kinds of issues.
17 Those documents are submitted to our team which
18 is comprised of design professionals and consultants from
19 MGT and the engineering subcontractor.
20 And we get those documents and review them for
21 these four areas and then we take our review data to the
22 district and we have between a two- and three-day work
23 shop with the district and the district's architects going
24 over what we have found and working with them to discuss
25 the issues and either incorporate some of the discussions
59
1 that we have or coming to some kind of agreement about
2 those issues.
3 And I'll just go through each one of these. The
4 facilities guidelines, what we do there is we use the
5 rules for site selection and school construction for
6 Wyoming public school buildings and the Wyoming public
7 school facilities guidelines, which identifies issues such
8 as the amount of gross square feet per student that's
9 allowed in an elementary, middle or high school, the size
10 of classrooms, size of auditoriums, types of spaces that
11 are in a building.
12 We take those guidelines and we've developed a
13 listing of those that we go through and analyze how that
14 project aligns with those guidelines and then we obviously
15 go through where there is an alignment with the architects
16 and the district.
17 The value engineering process is a process that
18 by looking at all of the different systems in the building
19 attempts to add value to the building. There's a
20 misconception, I think, generally that value engineering
21 is seen as nothing but a cost-cutting process. How can we
22 do this building cheaper, and that's not necessarily the
23 case. Oftentimes you might add value to the building by
24 increasing the initial costs but saving in long-term life
25 cycle costs.
60
1 So the question there becomes looking at each
2 system, what function is it providing, what is the
3 baseline cost you can get that function for, and if we're
4 not using that system at that baseline cost, what's the
5 value we're adding and is that value a good buy.
6 And so we go through a very structured process
7 of looking at that building and all the systems in that
8 building and assessing can we get more value for the same
9 cost.
10 Energy efficiency looks at the building and are
11 there ways to make it more energy efficient. There's a
12 lot of new technology out today. Some of it is very
13 applicable. Some of it is new and unfamiliar to some
14 people and so we can go through a process of talking about
15 those issues and are they applicable and whether or not
16 they're reasonable to include.
17 And that includes, you know, HVAC systems,
18 lighting systems, building construction, installation,
19 those kinds of standpoints.
20 I touched on the safety and security issues a
21 little earlier, but we have a checklist of design issues
22 that kind of promote safety and security in a school
23 building. Not all of them apply to every building. Some
24 of them apply more to elementary school buildings such as
25 including tamperproof fasteners in playground equipment.
61
1 Some to high school buildings more so as to the layout of
2 parking lots.
3 One of the elements we look at is have you
4 avoided having long, straight rows in parking lots where a
5 car would have a tendency to pick up speed? Do you have
6 speed bumps in the parking lots? Those kinds of issues.
7 Sight lines, how easy is it to surveillance,
8 keep surveillance of the whole building at all times? How
9 is security from strangers controlled, access to the
10 building?
11 Again, sometimes these issues don't apply. For
12 instance, one of the questions deals with the exterior
13 finish of the building and it asks is the material either
14 graffiti-proof or is it easily repaired or repainted when
15 damaged. Well, the first district we looked at, they
16 didn't have a problem with graffiti, never had had. That
17 was a situation in that instance that didn't apply.
18 We take these, go through the documents, we
19 reach a conclusion and then we sit down with the district
20 and go through their specific situation to come to some
21 kind of conclusions.
22 Our first exercise, there were instances where
23 we came to agreement on a lot of issues and there were
24 areas where we respectfully disagreed over what a
25 recommendation would be.
62
1 And so then we -- after we've had our workshop
2 we prepare a report that lists all of the issues that were
3 identified, what the district's response to that issue
4 was, and I agree -- I try to do that as fairly as possible
5 and as objectively as possible. And I try to get input
6 from the district as to what they want said there and then
7 what our comments or recommendations are in regard to that
8 issue.
9 SENATOR ANDERSON: Madam Chair.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Anderson.
11 SENATOR ANDERSON: Without elaboration,
12 the Columbine incident, how has that changed your thinking
13 in regard to design assessment or has it?
14 MR. CROMWELL: It definitely has, Madam
15 Chair and Senator Anderson. In developing our safety and
16 security assessment -- and I need to back up just a
17 second.
18 MGT after that incident and others decided that
19 we needed to expand our safety and security review for
20 schools. And we had previously done work with Jefferson
21 County School District and knew the people there.
22 We enlisted the help of one of the assistant
23 superintendents who had left the district after that
24 incident to develop a complete safety and security
25 assessment that we now perform that not only looks at
63
1 school design but looks at policies and procedures
2 throughout a school district. So everything from board
3 procedures to transportation issues to food safety, look
4 at it in a comprehensive sort of way.
5 For this assessment what we've done is focused
6 just on facility issues and I think there's always a
7 balance between providing a safe and secure environment
8 and not going to the extremes of prison-like environment.
9 One of the things I think really became clear
10 was that the issues in any school or any community are
11 different depending on that community's culture and
12 design, but there are some issues that are -- go across
13 all communities.
14 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Simpson and
15 then Senator Massie.
16 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Cromwell,
17 have you done any consulting with Park County School
18 District Number 6 in Cody concerning building safety,
19 facility safety issues? Have they contacted you at all?
20 They've been vandalized twice in the last three months,
21 fairly significantly.
22 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, no, I haven't.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Massie.
24 SENATOR MASSIE: Thank you, Madam Chair.
25 This looks like a good review process. There may be a
64
1 couple of issues in here that we want to talk about later
2 on.
3 What occurs to me maybe is a couple larger
4 issues that are missing that we may want to apply this to.
5 In other words, perhaps have some areas of emphasis. For
6 those school buildings in which construction is occurring
7 we may want to list those items that if they come up on an
8 inventory affect the ability to deliver that basket of
9 educational goods and services and those would have
10 particular emphasis in this process.
11 Likewise, you know, the issue that
12 Representative Baker brought up, for those facilities in
13 which construction is not occurring we may want to have
14 perhaps lesser areas of emphasis on some things because it
15 is not quite as important as those buildings in which it
16 is.
17 So I see this applying in many different
18 situations and we just need to identify perhaps as a
19 committee what those areas of emphasis are in which to
20 apply something like this.
21 COCHAIR DEVIN: Okay. Representative
22 Baker, thank you, Madam Chair, Dodds, I want to make sure
23 the committee understands this. As you go through value
24 engineering and energy efficiency, the report that you
25 submit -- and I've been reviewing one, I'm still
65
1 reviewing -- it doesn't come to, let's say, in your dollar
2 value -- it doesn't come to a dollar amount in your value
3 engineering. It doesn't come to a cost determination.
4 And so that has to occur somewhere, and I
5 presume that that's assumed to be worked out with the
6 school district's engineering and architectural firms; is
7 that correct?
8 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, Representative
9 Baker, yes, that's correct at this point.
10 Representative Baker: At this point?
11 MR. CROMWELL: Obviously one could make a
12 calculation, for instance, if our recommendation said
13 that, you know, the square footage of the schools should
14 be in line with the state guidelines and it isn't, one
15 could make a calculation that a reduction in square
16 footage was just cost per square foot and come up with
17 one.
18 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: So as we review and
19 look at -- as we look at your reviews of buildings that
20 are planned to be built, construction projects that are
21 ongoing, it is not an okay, you can take the district's
22 word for it and have X dollars or you can take your word
23 for it and have Y dollars. This is a work together
24 situation where we attempt to work out those differences
25 and then we as responsible caretakers of the money of the
66
1 state of Wyoming will then come to some conclusion of that
2 necessary means to handle the situation that is before us
3 and meet the educational need.
4 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, Representative
5 Baker, I agree with that. We tried to approach these
6 reviews as a cooperative effort. Obviously when a
7 professional has put forth a design and someone comes in
8 and asks questions about it, it can be a less than happy
9 situation, but what we try to do is approach it as
10 professionals and work together to get the most value for
11 the dollar and the safest design building we can and the
12 most efficient building.
13 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Madam Chair, I want
14 to point out that several districts had approached me,
15 knowing that I sit both on the JAC and this committee, and
16 they were extremely fearful about MGT coming in and
17 saying, "Okay, this building can be built for X, Y, Z.
18 Get out of here. The rest of you guys go take a flying
19 leap," whatever. And I'm not going to get into that.
20 Anyway, I want to make it clear to those and to
21 this committee that that is not what occurred and that the
22 situation doesn't need to be confrontational as they begin
23 to work with the value engineers and with value
24 engineering. And so I think the process has worked so
25 far. The practical matter of that final dollar figure,
67
1 I'm not sure how that's all going to work out tomorrow,
2 but I guess we're feeling our way through the process
3 there that does need to go forward.
4 I want to be clear to this committee, there's no
5 recommendation that $2.46 million be cut from this
6 appropriation that's set forth here. That's not what is
7 set forth here.
8 MR. CROMWELL: Madam Chair, can I add a
9 note? In fact, in one of the examples that we will be
10 reviewing in the next couple months, they are as of
11 standard course of practice doing their own value
12 engineering. So this is a very common, typical thing that
13 goes on in the design process.
14 And the other thing I would like to add is that
15 as the committee members, if they have a chance to read
16 the report that's been done, that's on the web, we would
17 welcome any comments or questions that you might have as
18 far as approving the report, format, content.
19 COCHAIR DEVIN: Then I apologize for
20 bouncing you back and forth. I didn't realize a different
21 person was going to do that. But I think that gives you a
22 little background. We have a process that has been in
23 transition and our goal is to take more of the question
24 and more of limbo out of that process, firm up what we
25 know works, get timelines in here and get a process that
68
1 will work but hopefully will incorporate the things that
2 we've found of value as we've gone along and do something
3 about the questions that are out there.
4 Mr. Curry.
5 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, I think going
6 into just what was done, and in fact the earlier
7 discussion points out that elements of the process of a
8 process are underway --
9 COCHAIR DEVIN: Excuse me. We're back on
10 selective issues number 2?
11 MR. CURRY: Right. We've identified five
12 major components: Needs determination, planning, review,
13 priority setting and construction.
14 Needs determination has already been underway.
15 It has been discussed earlier by Dodds identifying the --
16 inventorying the needs and the like, the different things
17 that are happening.
18 In terms of the pipeline project, the pattern
19 has at least been started for review. There hasn't been
20 particular discussions as yet about the role of a formal
21 planning process and a number of states around the country
22 that have moved into a much greater degree of state
23 involvement rely heavily on a multi-year planning process,
24 although, again, one element of that planning process has
25 emerged from your deliberations in terms of major
69
1 maintenance.
2 The establishment of priorities; this was an
3 area that as we discussed the role of the numbers, what
4 does a 55 mean or a 74, how does that work when the roof
5 is bad or when there's no fire alarm? A critical element
6 is the establishment of a priority system that can weigh
7 the relative elements of suitability of the nature of
8 deficiencies, of whether it is more appropriate to go
9 ahead with a replacement as opposed to a renovation and
10 how does that all relate in terms of the needs of
11 educational buildings and noneducational buildings.
12 So a critical element of an overall process is
13 the establishment of priorities, and then as part of that,
14 who is going to carry the requests to the legislature, to
15 the governor and what's the legislature's role.
16 And then following appropriation, there to close
17 the loop it is construction oversight and to what extent
18 should the State be involved in construction oversight.
19 Now, there's a number of models out there and
20 there's a number of ways to proceed, and what I attempted
21 to do in here is to raise some questions.
22 For example, in needs determination should needs
23 continue to be determined by the responsible state agency?
24 Currently the responsible state agency is the Department
25 of Education. That's another question to be addressed at
70
1 some point in this process as to how you want to structure
2 which agency or alignment you want to have to be the
3 responsible administering body. But should they continue
4 to be determined either directly or with an outside third
5 party or should they be determined directly by the school
6 district, and if the latter, what oversight should be
7 exercised to ensure consistency.
8 Currently you've been following a model that
9 says we will leave this to the responsible state agency,
10 generally through a contract, to bring to bear a system
11 that will identify and inventory the deficiencies that
12 exist in terms of the physical structure, the suitability,
13 the technology readiness, the accessibility of the various
14 buildings.
15 A particular question that you need to decide as
16 you address this is do you want to continue doing that or
17 do you see a need to change that. Then certain things
18 then follow along after that.
19 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair, are we
20 going to discuss each of these issues as we go?
21 COCHAIR DEVIN: That seemed to work fairly
22 well on the other process. If you're comfortable with
23 that, Mr. Curry.
24 MR. CURRY: Very much, Madam Chair.
25 COCHAIR DEVIN: Let's do that.
71
1 SENATOR CATHCART: Well, Madam Chair, our
2 current process seems to me to be somewhat broken. We
3 have a responsible state agency but they're not
4 provided -- they're provided all the information to make
5 their decisions. That information is provided by the
6 local district. So just recently we looked at a proposal,
7 for example, that we didn't have, in my opinion, the
8 adequate information provided by the district.
9 For example, remodel. The remodel situation
10 presented to the responsible state agency by the district
11 costs $167 a square foot to remodel. You can build new
12 cheaper than that. So I'm not certain that currently the
13 system we have is working because the responsible state
14 agency is relying too much on information provided by the
15 district which can say whatever the district wants it to
16 say.
17 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, without
18 commenting one way or another on that, I think we're
19 getting into in this case the information associated with
20 a response to an identification of need, that, okay, we
21 have a need here and then one approaches this and says,
22 "Okay, we're going to solve this problem in a particular
23 way." And then forwarding that request for funding.
24 That's not an untypical process. However, the
25 lack of an organized planning element in the current
72
1 process I think is what is broken. And that is how --
2 what are the options, what options were explored in
3 addressing the problems that were identified? And how
4 does this fit into the school district's overall plan that
5 it sees as being the most necessary and appropriate way of
6 solving all of its construction and repair and renovation
7 problems, and for an organized review of that plan before
8 jumping immediately to a project.
9 Because jumping immediately to a project leaves
10 an awful lot of questions on the table as to why did you
11 decide to do this particular thing. Well, we thought it
12 was the best way to go. What options did you consider?
13 Those are questions that really ought to be addressed in
14 an organized planning process, in my opinion.
15 However, you know, there's a lot of ways to go
16 about it, but that's why I put in here the reference to
17 considering districtwide facility planning on a multi-year
18 basis.
19 Because in that way, Senator, those issues can
20 be identified and there can be a dialogue, as Dodds has
21 described, in terms of working with the district in a
22 cooperative manner to make sure that all of the
23 information is provided and the most cost-effective
24 approaches are followed, as opposed to a response-type
25 approach like we won't get involved with you until we see
73
1 the proposal.
2 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Coe.
3 SENATOR COE: Madam Chair, thank you. I
4 noticed in what I went through here there were two states
5 out there, I think Arizona and Alaska, that take total
6 responsibility for capital construction.
7 What type of a needs determination process do
8 Alaska -- not Alaska -- Hawaii and Arizona have in place
9 when in fact the State is taking total responsibility for
10 school capital construction, which I sense based on the
11 most recent Supreme Court ruling is the way we're
12 proceeding? Do you have any idea how they do it? Do they
13 still rely on the local districts and say, "Okay, you
14 brought us a plan here and we're going to pay for it and
15 here's how we're going to determine the needs"?
16 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, Senator Coe, in
17 Hawaii the -- there is only one school system and it
18 operates in a manner as part of the same organization and
19 they develop multi-year plans for the schools and the
20 various islands. There are administrative districts and
21 they work with the administrative superintendents and the
22 building person and look at how critical the particular
23 needs are.
24 And they've had a general agreement with the
25 legislature for a commitment of funding and so they'll
74
1 bring forward the priority list to the legislature and the
2 legislature will fund those, plus projects that they feel
3 that they want to fund that goes beyond that. It is a lot
4 like a university system type of capital approach.
5 In the case of Arizona, the state is fully
6 responsible for new construction and there is some
7 district requirement to bring -- to handle remediation of
8 repairs. The state agency works very closely with all of
9 the various school districts and there's a lot of school
10 districts in Arizona. I think there's six or seven in
11 Phoenix alone.
12 They work very closely and have set up some
13 very, very detailed prescriptions for new construction,
14 and so they've attempted -- they've tended to try to
15 minimize the planning options in their approach by laying
16 out what things will be acceptable. There's still aspects
17 of planning, there are still design differences, but
18 they've been very, very detailed in what is going to go in
19 the building.
20 I should also mention that Hawaii has books
21 about this thick for each grade level that in detail lay
22 out the educational specifications, how each classroom is
23 going to look. It is a very centralized process and a
24 district -- or a school has to apply for an exception to
25 the ed specs before it can proceed to a different
75
1 configuration internally.
2 If you go from one school -- we did. We spent a
3 year working with the State of Hawaii on this. We
4 recommended a little bit more flexibility because you can
5 go from school to school and you're seeing basically the
6 same school unless they have requested an exception from
7 the state specs.
8 But again, in these types of approaches, they --
9 both of those states have felt it necessary to be
10 particularly prescriptive in terms of what is acceptable.
11 Other states like West Virginia and Georgia in
12 particular stress a multi-year planning approach where
13 they will work with the district up front to go over these
14 issues and to try to apply these criteria before the
15 requests are formulated so that the plan, then, becomes
16 your early warning system, if you will, as to what the
17 issues are that are coming forward and what is the likely
18 long-term fiscal impact.
19 So these are some of the choices that need to be
20 made as you develop a process. Are you going to stress
21 planning or are you going to tell your agency to be very
22 prescriptive in terms of what those schools are going to
23 look like?
24 If you want to augment.
25 MR. TEATER: Madam Chair, I would like to
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1 supplement some of this information more from a
2 practitioner's point of view. When you look at the needs
3 assessment and/or the needs determination and planning
4 part of it, the details of how that works out we can get
5 into, but there's really kind of four major areas that
6 really come to bear on that.
7 One of them is the population pressures. When
8 you're doing needs assessment, do you have growing student
9 enrollment, dropping enrollment or flat enrollment and how
10 does that affect that community and those schools. That's
11 one of the elements.
12 The other one is the condition of the buildings
13 and Dodds has talked about that component in the needs
14 assessment.
15 The educational suitability component is another
16 one.
17 And then the last one that deserves some
18 consideration are site issues, size of site issues.
19 Again, that's kind of a mixture and you have to
20 use some common sense and some judgment in that you may
21 have a facility that -- well, when I was in charge of a
22 school district, construction of a school district and I
23 had many schools coming to me saying, "Me first," we had
24 to have some way to sort that out.
25 And those were the major elements that we were
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1 looking at to help sort out the priorities that Mr. Curry
2 is talking about.
3 There's some other issues kind of related to the
4 planning part of it that we've alluded to and that's the
5 community involvement, how much community involvement is
6 in that planning and how long has it gone on, is this a
7 one-man show or is this a community involvement show, and
8 also the educational specifications, have you really taken
9 a look ahead of time so it is not a knee-jerk reaction to
10 a felt need.
11 Those kinds of issues as you build it into your
12 process seem to me to be from a practitioner's point of
13 view just fundamental elements to your process.
14 COCHAIR DEVIN: On the needs
15 determination, you listed four and one was site
16 limitations or site --
17 MR. TEATER: Site considerations.
18 COCHAIR DEVIN: Site considerations. Can
19 you tell me what you're thinking when you use that term?
20 MR. TEATER: Well, I think that that --
21 well, some schools are bound in a neighborhood. For
22 example, it may be a very small school site. An example
23 that I can recall was that we had a school that came in
24 and the score on the condition of the building was kind of
25 borderline whether it was cost effective to add more -- to
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1 renovate that school or to build new, but when we looked
2 at the site, the site size was so small and so constrained
3 that that tilted it over.
4 We said, you know, it is a close call when you
5 look at just building condition, but when you look at the
6 site, we can't solve that. So this one probably needs to
7 be a school -- new school that's built.
8 We had some others which we said, you know,
9 again, it is right in the balance whether or not it is
10 good to renovate or better to build new. But when we
11 looked at educational suitability issues we said this is a
12 very suitable school. There's a lot of good things on
13 suitability. This is a good candidate for renovation.
14 We're going to do that.
15 COCHAIR DEVIN: Would that incorporate the
16 issue that Representative Baker raised earlier where you
17 might -- you have two students in a school and does a
18 modular unit make more sense, if there's another school
19 ten miles down the road? Is that where you make that
20 analysis?
21 MR. TEATER: Madam Chair, absolutely.
22 When I was involved in those kinds of decisions, folks
23 would come to me with a plan and a school that had five or
24 six children involved in a program and another school that
25 was close by came to me with five or six students in the
79
1 same program, and they each wanted to build the program in
2 their school.
3 And we sat them down and said, "Is there a way
4 that we can build one of these programs in one of the
5 schools, save some dollars and still keep the program
6 going, keep that basket intact?" And so there's some
7 common sense that has to be placed in that.
8 COCHAIR DEVIN: You go first, Mr. Cochair,
9 and then Representative Baker.
10 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chair, I just
11 wanted to -- you know, back on the needs, Dodds and I have
12 talked about this, I'm an old, retired architect and I've
13 been retired for 20 years. I haven't designed any school
14 buildings for 20 years. It seems the process is backwards
15 now from what it used to be or certainly is in Wyoming.
16 You know, in the old days, I will refer to this
17 as the old days, that was the '70s. We established the
18 need which was if you need a school, you need a school.
19 Then we developed a program. I think we're in line so far
20 with this. And what we did after that in the old days was
21 determine what the budget was and then we designed the
22 school. That was your fourth element.
23 Now we don't even mention budgets, and as a
24 result, we're getting schools that cost two and three
25 times as much per square foot as schools in surrounding
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1 states.
2 And you say, "Well, gosh, we don't want money to
3 be the determining element," but money is the determining
4 element when we're building schools because we have a lot
5 of schools to build. So in this needs or program area I
6 would like to see look, we're going to build the school,
7 we need this school, it has to be for so many students and
8 right now the general cost per student is X, and there
9 should be -- you know, when the design comes in it should
10 be somewhere in that area.
11 And the school that Senator Cathcart looked at
12 the other day -- and we'll discuss that this afternoon --
13 was three times more than any other school.
14 So these are things I would certainly like to
15 see the budget item get in there, what is your design
16 criteria, because as an architect, I don't think I could
17 design a school without a budget. I would want to put
18 gold leaf primarily because my fee was based on how much
19 the school cost.
20 So I think this is a consideration and I want us
21 to start talking about it. It seems we're hesitant to
22 talk about this because they jump up and say, "Money can't
23 be an object as to what our schools should cost," but I
24 think it has to be an option because we have to build or
25 repair a lot of schools here in the near future and we do
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1 have limited finances.
2 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Baker, that should
3 be a good segue for you.
4 SENATOR COE: Senator Baker?
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: Sorry.
6 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: There's another --
7 when we're in the needs determination, I've pencilled in
8 needs identification as another step here. And I will
9 tell you why I do this. As I look down the lower scoring
10 conditions of the buildings that are used -- I have
11 already pointed out that some aren't -- the buildings that
12 are used, I see some that have been applied in and are
13 very active in renovating and replacing and doing work on
14 the buildings.
15 And I see some districts that (indicating) what,
16 we don't know. And they're sitting there with a
17 building -- and I do know that Hyattville -- no, Tensleep
18 Elementary, they moved from a 45.5 well into the 60s by
19 using their major maintenance bucks. They've done a good
20 job maintaining that building.
21 But we don't know about some of these -- those
22 that haven't applied for money from the State for
23 renovation. And we by Supreme Court decision -- and this
24 is an area we didn't contest in the lawsuit -- we said
25 okay, it is the State's responsibility pretty much, it is
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1 our responsibility, okay, we will go forward. But there's
2 buildings out there that may not be identified that we
3 don't know yet. I mean, in two years we'll know somewhat
4 and then that will be old data and, I mean, we'll work and
5 in four years we'll know again.
6 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair.
7 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
8 MR. CURRY: Representative Baker, one of
9 the limitations here in laying out these things in
10 sections is that in reality they flow together in that if
11 you have periodic needs identification and determination
12 and that feeds into a planning process, then you -- and
13 the planning process just doesn't talk about new
14 construction but also talks about major maintenance, you
15 start closing the circle.
16 And you've engaged with a state agency that is
17 proactive, that is working on a continuing basis with the
18 districts, then those items start to assume a visibility
19 in the overall plan and it forms the basis for dialogue
20 between that agency and the district so that one says,
21 "All right, you know, our observation is that you may have
22 a problem over here, that we're working with you on this
23 and through the planning process does this building need
24 to have a" --
25 MR. TEATER: New roof.
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1 MR. CURRY: Or another needs assessment
2 done on just that one building, not the entire district.
3 But maybe some conditions have changed, there was a
4 problem that developed so let's get that and inject that
5 into the plan so that there is -- and that the plan,
6 then -- of course now I'm starting to answer the questions
7 which I was not supposed to do -- but then the plan
8 becomes a living and moving document. As you accomplish
9 things, you update your plan and so you have a continuing
10 blueprint for your future work.
11 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Madam Chair.
12 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Baker.
13 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: My follow-up.
14 You've identified something I think is probably key here
15 in what I think you said. Let's make sure I understood
16 what you said from what I think you said.
17 I think you said a proactive state agency that's
18 involved in the review of existing buildings and the
19 maintenance that's ongoing in those existing buildings and
20 the need, I see that proactive state agency as -- and here
21 I'm jumping to a conclusion. Let me stop here. Is that
22 what I understood you to say?
23 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, Representative,
24 yes.
25 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: I see -- my
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1 conclusion as I look at that proactive state agency, I see
2 the Department of Education as probably being the wrong
3 place to be proactive planning for building of state
4 agencies -- of state schools because I see somewhat of a
5 conflict with the political structure that's set up.
6 Would you agree with that or would you stick
7 your foot into that trap?
8 MR. CURRY: Well, Madam Chair,
9 Representative Baker, I wouldn't ascribe it -- I wouldn't
10 go into the political portion of it, but I think it is
11 pretty clear that throughout the country the roles of
12 state departments of education have been to provide
13 leadership, provide guidance, to distribute grants, to
14 provide technical and program assistance. It is generally
15 an arm's length relationship with a heavy emphasis on
16 local control and a narrowly prescribed role for the state
17 agency.
18 And in that sense I would agree with you that if
19 you are going to -- it would be -- it would be
20 antithetical or a different role for that agency to
21 perform to be out there in the field saying, "Okay, now,
22 what are we going to do about this fire alarm system?" It
23 is not that they couldn't do it, but it would certainly be
24 different than most of the functions a State Department of
25 Education would perform.
85
1 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Madam Chair, it is,
2 in my view, antithetical -- if I'm using that word
3 right -- for the department. So in effect you're
4 suggesting a semi-independent or a totally independent
5 review process?
6 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, there's a number
7 of models out there that go from a separate state agency
8 that's charged with that responsibility to something that
9 involves an overlap in terms of representation from the
10 Board of Education or the Department of Education to
11 ensure that the program side is listened to.
12 A model that I thought has some positive
13 attributes is used in New Mexico where they have a capital
14 outlay council. Although the staffing is provided by the
15 department and it tends to support why I think probably
16 separately budgeted staffing is appropriate, the various
17 interest groups are represented on the council. The
18 legislature is represented through staff directors. The
19 governor is represented through the governor's assistant
20 and the director of finance for the state and the
21 educational side is represented through the state
22 superintendent and a representative from the Board of
23 Education.
24 There's a number of models that you could
25 examine that would make -- it helps to ensure that an
86
1 agency outside of the department is taking into account
2 the educational factors that that's why the buildings are
3 there.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: Let's take a ten-minute
5 break. We will come back at 11:05.
6 (Recess taken 10:53 a.m. until 11:10 a.m.)
7 COCHAIR DEVIN: If you will go ahead, we
8 were talking about the fluid process of this and a little
9 bit about how do you handle it: Do you place it within a
10 department, do you place it with a separate agency and
11 some of those options.
12 MR. CURRY: Yes, Madam Chair. On the
13 second page of the material governance is definitely an
14 issue because somebody is going -- whatever process you
15 think is appropriate, and I hope we can have perhaps some
16 discussion of have we covered the various elements of the
17 process, not necessarily to answer all of these, but that
18 inevitably somebody has to do the work and the process
19 that you use is at least in part going to dictate the
20 nature of the organization that's doing the work.
21 As we discussed this morning, I think that at
22 least exploring options that are separate and apart from
23 the current arrangement I think should be explored very
24 carefully. You have a model that exists within the state
25 right now, the Water Development Agency, that certainly
87
1 could serve as a prototype in terms of thinking about how
2 do you marshal the particular expertise needed to work
3 closely on a hand-to-hand basis with the various school
4 districts around the state in terms of working through
5 these matters and then applying the various elements of
6 the process that we've been discussing.
7 That may well be an early point of direction
8 from you because what I'm hoping to get from the committee
9 is what you would like us to do to carry this forward and
10 bring you perhaps a think piece, a prototype that goes
11 along the lines that you feel comfortable with, that then
12 you could say, "Well, let's tweak it this way and that
13 way." Because all we're doing is laying out some
14 questions for your discussion to see if there's some
15 degree of consensus on the particular elements.
16 And one thing is I think it is important to get
17 is do you feel that the process should include all of
18 these particular things plus the things that have been
19 mentioned like budget and design criteria and the like and
20 how do you feel about the matter of governance.
21 COCHAIR DEVIN: I wanted to ask you one
22 question. You listed establishment of priorities as D,
23 and when I looked like at Hawaii and they did priority
24 factors, they had categories such as health, safety,
25 security, support facilities, et cetera, and then they had
88
1 them ranked in order of how they might address them.
2 I guess I wondered, is there any significance
3 that that's labeled D? I would see that as having to
4 almost precede in some way the needs and planning piece to
5 say that these are recognized as the highest priorities.
6 But I'm sure there's several different ways to think about
7 it.
8 MR. CURRY: Early on -- Madam Chair, early
9 on as an organization gets settled it is important to let
10 the public and let the legislature and for the legislature
11 to have input into what are the highest priority things
12 because that will affect the nature of planning. It can
13 make -- it should ensure that your needs determination is
14 keyed to identifying those things which are of the highest
15 priority.
16 It is just one of these things that I guess I
17 put it down as D not in terms of importance but that once
18 the planning is done and there is a clear sense of what
19 the projects are, there's going to have to be a ranking
20 scheme.
21 Now, the ranking scheme probably should precede
22 that, but the application of the ranking would take place
23 about then. That, then, on a sequential basis would
24 produce the projects that would go forward for funding.
25 And then there's a question of the level of detail of
89
1 legislative review of those projects and the like. Then
2 you go longitudinally to construction.
3 But you're absolutely correct that an early
4 aspect is the establishment of not only priorities but
5 establishment of guidelines, and that is a process that
6 ought to involve significant input from the educational
7 community in terms of the nature of the programs to be
8 supported. And I think those are pretty well defined, but
9 there needs to be a close interaction at that point.
10 That then serves as the guidance in the planning
11 process.
12 COCHAIR DEVIN: And may I ask what type of
13 expertise you would recommend in the agency that dealt
14 with this? I would assume we would need some engineering,
15 some architectural, some budget. But what areas of --
16 MR. CURRY: And facility planning.
17 COCHAIR DEVIN: What areas of expertise
18 would you recommend that we would consider? I'm having
19 trouble hearing.
20 MR. TEATER: Madam Chair, I would think
21 you would want to have within that the educational
22 components.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: Would you list what you
24 would envision as possibilities?
25 MR. TEATER: Engineers, architects,
90
1 educators, finance.
2 MR. CURRY: Facility planning.
3 MR. TEATER: Facility planning. What are
4 we missing?
5 MR. CURRY: And by facility planning,
6 somebody who understands population forecasting,
7 utilization, things like that that deal with some of these
8 matters other than just solving the need to fix this, that
9 or something else, but gets at the overall picture of
10 where is the population going, what are the options, the
11 nonconstruction options that exist that could be employed
12 such as closure of a school or relocation of a program.
13 COCHAIR DEVIN: So you're saying engineer,
14 architect, educator, facility planner?
15 MR. CURRY: And finance specialist.
16 COCHAIR DEVIN: Finance.
17 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Would there be some
18 need for expertise on maintenance and operations in
19 maintaining internal HVAC, you know, those specialists? I
20 don't know. It depends on how -- engineering and
21 architectural expertise?
22 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, if I were running
23 an organization like that, I would try to get that in my
24 engineer, somebody who understood the engineering from the
25 context of building operation so that that base would be
91
1 covered, but I don't know if it would be necessary to have
2 a separate position for that.
3 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Thank you. Sorry
4 for the interruption.
5 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Do you think it would be
6 necessary to have a separate position for all of these?
7 Say the demographics or the population, I mean, we do that
8 already in several departments. The information is there
9 and, you know, it would just be, how can I say, a
10 consultant to that organization.
11 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, absolutely.
12 We're really talking here about talents and not
13 necessarily positions. I can use as a good example my
14 colleague. Dodds is both a licensed architect and an
15 educator and former teacher. Dave is a facility planner
16 and a former superintendent.
17 You try to bring those talents together so that
18 there's an understanding of why you're building the
19 buildings or why you're repairing them and their role in
20 educating children.
21 So you want to have those talents but how many
22 staff you would need, just as long as you've got those
23 bases covered as well as what's the volume of getting out?
24 And if I were arguing here for something, it would be to
25 make sure that there is enough people to interact with the
92
1 49 districts around the state on a regular basis. That's
2 really important so that they're up to speed on what is
3 going on and are able to work with the district
4 administrators on a continuing basis.
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: President Coe.
6 SENATOR COE: Madam Chair, I hate to say
7 this because I'm frustrated, and I told Senator Massie at
8 the break, I think all of this stuff will come into play
9 and fall into place, because we're going to find ourself,
10 I'm totally convinced with the Supreme Court decision --
11 and Ray Hunkins is sitting there -- I think the State is
12 going to have full responsibility to build the schools. I
13 don't think they're going to change that. I really don't.
14 Think all of these things will come into place as we
15 ultimately get that decision from the boys down the
16 street. I don't know if Ray Hunkins agrees with me, but I
17 feel strongly like we will go like Arizona and Hawaii,
18 that we will have the total responsibility.
19 I worry now in that we're looking at projects
20 right now that are being submitted from local districts,
21 one up north fairly close to where I live, that have a lot
22 of gold leaf on them.
23 And, you know, I hear the interaction with local
24 districts and I think that's important and we've struggled
25 for local control, but in this particular case with what
93
1 is going on down the street, I don't think local control
2 is going to exist two years from today. I think we will
3 have total responsibility for building schoolhouses. I
4 think all of this will fall right into place because when
5 we start paying for all of this, all of it, we will figure
6 out a way to do it the right way, I think.
7 I just had to say that.
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chair.
9 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mr. Cochair.
10 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think we're talking
11 about the governance now. We've talked about this and how
12 to do it in many ways, and fortunately at the ESC
13 conference we had a very good meeting on governance.
14 I think that, you know, it would be good if we
15 kept this within our Department of Education and still in
16 some way have it autonomous, enough -- how can I say it --
17 not subject to the whims of the local -- the current
18 politics, let me put it that way because it is important
19 that these people have a continuing view of how they're
20 going to do this. And you can't change horses every four
21 or eight years and have that continuation.
22 But I think I would hate to see us doing -- I
23 agree with Senator Coe. I think this is going to come to
24 some type of state organization that's going to govern
25 this. I would hate to see it go in the direction of
94
1 Hawaii. I think that sterilizes our schools. I do have a
2 meeting in Arizona next month to meet with these folks but
3 I'm anxious to see how they're doing it and they've agreed
4 to talk with me. They don't have that absolute control.
5 The thing that concerns me as an architect --
6 and I hear this over and over. We can do a cookie cutter
7 type of school. I would not like to see that happen. I
8 think architects can offer us a lot along the lines of
9 innovation and design, but I think we need to give them
10 the right type of parameters. And I will say what I said
11 before, give them a budget. Don't say, "Go out and design
12 something and then we'll give you the money to build it."
13 I would like to see us have the governance, but
14 I would also hate to lose the innovation that the
15 architects can give us if they're given the right
16 direction.
17 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, I think that this
18 underscores the need for a planning component because
19 assuming that you're correct and the State of Wyoming at
20 the state level has total responsibility for providing the
21 facilities. The only way that there's going to be local
22 input, community input, things that take into account the
23 differences that exist across the state and in the various
24 localities is a process that lays out and comes up with
25 ways to solve problems.
95
1 And those decisions are going to be the results
2 of that is going to be different in one part of a state
3 than another just because of the difference in the
4 communities. And that's probably the only way that you're
5 going to save the vitality that is commonly associated
6 with the words "local control," is by getting local
7 participation and local input into the process. The
8 control ultimately, if you're correct, and probably are,
9 will be at the state level.
10 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair.
11 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Simpson.
12 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Curry, is the
13 MGT familiar with the Wyoming Water Development Commission
14 and the three branches of that agency that address water
15 development projects in Wyoming?
16 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair, Representative
17 Simpson, other than just reading the statute, no, we
18 haven't studied its operation or how it works. We haven't
19 been asked to do that as yet. We could look into that if
20 would you like us to.
21 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair, it
22 seems to me that we have the model to do this with school
23 capital construction or even government capital
24 construction, whatever you want to call it.
25 Mike Besom told us on the administrative levels
96
1 1 and 2, planning studies that they do, they do the two
2 levels. They don't overbuild, they build good projects,
3 they don't build blue sky and they're conservative. Those
4 are four pretty critical things that we're trying to
5 achieve in school capital construction. They have a
6 biennium budget of a million and a half bucks. We could
7 waste that much on one project.
8 And what we're seeing come to the legislature
9 for funding requests are astounding at times, and, you
10 know, we've got the model. We can adapt that to the
11 particular criterias that fit with school construction as
12 opposed to pipeline construction, and they're a little
13 different, but I think we need to -- and if we're talking
14 about keeping it in the DOE, you know, that doesn't
15 concern me.
16 But I do think that we need those three separate
17 branches of planning, construction and administration
18 within the DOE and that that expertise that you're talking
19 about, Madam Chairman, fits in there. And Mike Besom told
20 us that consultants are used frequently on the planning
21 end of it. So the talent comes in there.
22 Once you've identified the need and the budget
23 and what is actually needed and what you're going to
24 build, then you know and it is pretty much laid out.
25 So I hate -- this whole issue is confusing as
97
1 hell to me as to all of these things. I mean, we could
2 sit here for weeks and talk about this. So I'm trying to
3 distill it where I can understand it and get a grip on it
4 and it seems like that to me makes the most sense.
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: I think your point is well
6 made in that we've, you know, somewhere got to localize
7 the expertise to interact with the districts because the
8 districts are even -- have expressed need for that. At
9 this point they're going out and individually contracting
10 or not getting it in many cases.
11 Also, that gives us the opportunity to use what
12 we learned on one project or two projects or three or the
13 next ten, and at present we don't have that except as
14 people informally talk to each other. But we certainly
15 don't have the expertise as an appropriations committee or
16 education committee or legislature as a whole to be able
17 to go to somebody to give us that feedback of expertise.
18 Senator Massie.
19 SENATOR MASSIE: Thank you, Madam Chair.
20 I like the model, the water development model. With
21 regard to having the Select Committee of legislators
22 involved in this as a way of helping to organize the needs
23 and bring it to the larger body for discussion, I like
24 that part of it.
25 Frankly, I think that we need to, though, on the
98
1 other hand -- I think that we need to create a separate K
2 through 12 school capital construction agency that does
3 have some kind of formal relationship to the department as
4 far as getting their involvement, but it should be in the
5 executive branch, director appointed by the governor, and
6 with employees with the kind of expertise that we've just
7 talked about, as you brought up, Madam Chair, reviewing
8 plans from the districts, these are five-year plans
9 updated annually with regard to major maintenance and
10 capital construction, to have this kind of local input.
11 I don't see a need for a citizen commission like
12 the Water Development Commission has but instead, have
13 that legislative body there as a way of interacting with
14 the department and then bringing those recommendations
15 forward to the legislature.
16 COCHAIR DEVIN: So our choices as I see it
17 would be to put it, as Senator Massie describes, a
18 separate agency which I was reading, we've got two
19 agencies. Water was one of them, I can't remember, but
20 they would sit apart with the governors under the
21 administrative branch. The other would be to put them in
22 the Department of Education purely, as a portion, and the
23 other would be a quasi piece that I've read some states
24 have done which is they're sort of a separate arm's length
25 department within the department.
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1 Are those the three options you've seen out
2 there in function?
3 MR. CURRY: Yes, Madam Chair.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: And have you had
5 experience that one worked better than the other or are
6 there -- what can you lend us from your observations, if
7 anything?
8 MR. CURRY: Madam Chairman, I'm inclined
9 to the separate agency model with a close working
10 relationship with the Department and Board of Education so
11 that the standards reflect the professional education
12 decisions but that the administration is done by people
13 highly skilled in planning and budgeting for capital
14 construction and maintenance and the like. Whether it is
15 a single appointed agency head or a commission structure,
16 that's a question that you as legislators always grapple
17 with when you're trying to decide how to form an agency.
18 Those are things that, you know, can always be a
19 combination of appointees and ex officio members and
20 things of that nature. But I think your most productive
21 potential result is as a separate agency with separate
22 budget identity but with close working relations with the
23 Board and Department of Education.
24 SENATOR ANDERSON: Madam Chair.
25 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
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1 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you, Madam Chair.
2 If I may, taken a little further, we've talked about
3 whether it be a cap con, the resources that would be
4 available to the new agency we've created in your study of
5 other states, I think the relationship that that new cap
6 con agency would have with the Department of Education is
7 pretty obvious.
8 But given the discussion we've had about
9 different areas and levels of expertise brings to mind the
10 existing resources we have in terms of expertise within,
11 say, our fire marshal's office or within our state
12 engineer's office or A&I or technology.
13 With your experience in other states did you
14 encounter any use of the master agency of other agencies
15 within the government to bring that school cap con thing
16 into play; in other words, without hiring a lot of other
17 consultants they might draw expertise from the existing
18 agencies?
19 MR. CURRY: Madam Chair -- and both of you
20 guys please chime in here -- one of the areas that's most
21 common is in terms of population forecasting. Usually
22 somebody in a state is involved in the demographic side
23 and that's an area that should really not be duplicated.
24 One of the problems of piggybacking, if you
25 will, say on the state, say whoever is in charge of state
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1 institutions and capital grounds buildings is that usually
2 they will contend that their plate is already full with
3 their responsibilities and they're glad to share expertise
4 and comments and the like, but they are unwilling to take
5 on extra responsibilities because of workload
6 considerations.
7 I know in some cases -- I'm thinking of New
8 Mexico's arrangement. I think it exists elsewhere -- the
9 director of that agency is an ex officio member of the
10 governing group or advisory group to the school
11 construction so that it increases the potential for not
12 duplicating efforts, just understanding that the fire
13 marshal does this already, don't go redo it, you know,
14 bring that to bear on an interagency basis.
15 You want to elaborate?
16 MR. TEATER: As I listened to Mr. Curry's
17 comments, I think one of the other issues from, again, a
18 practical standpoint on how things go is the cadence with
19 which these projects have to keep moving.
20 And my experience has been when you're pulling
21 people from different agencies to work on it, they
22 certainly have that expertise, but it often slows the
23 process down and fragments it some.
24 COCHAIR DEVIN: I'm going to just ask that
25 we just take a time-out from this piece. We're going to
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1 lose the opportunity to have Mr. Hunkins answer any
2 questions by noon, and I guess I would just like to open
3 it and come back, then, depending on what length of time
4 that takes.
5 And I'm particularly interested in our looking
6 before we lose that at the issue number 1 and issue number
7 4 and the comments as to what this -- where this committee
8 might need to look, what our standing with the legal
9 opinions, pieces that are out there are, where we have
10 some reasonably firm answers versus where we don't and are
11 our answers reasonably firm in these areas, should we
12 proceed on this at this time? I guess those two areas are
13 of particular interest to me before we lose the
14 opportunity to ask you questions.
15 MR. HUNKINS: Well, thank you, Madam
16 Chairman, and I'm happy to respond to that for purposes of
17 review, the last sentence in issue number 1 under funding
18 structure states, "In view of current court language,
19 complete elimination of local authority may not be an
20 option." And of course issue number 4 is the thorny
21 problem of enhancements which I think has troubled
22 everyone in light of the Supreme Court language.
23 I am in the process of preparing -- in fact, I
24 brought with me a partial draft of a memorandum to
25 Mr. Nelson on the subject of local control versus state
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1 control, K-12 education, and whether or not that's a
2 legislative policy choice or a judicially prescribed
3 mandate. This should be hopefully approved by the
4 Attorney General next week and in your hands, I would
5 hope, by the end of next week.
6 But let me respond to that issue by quoting a
7 short paragraph out of the Campbell I decision. In
8 dealing with these thorny issues I think you have to look
9 at the body of law that has been produced in these school
10 finance decisions, beginning with Washakie and going on to
11 the Campbell I decision in 1995 and then, of course, the
12 Campbell II decision which was issued last February. And
13 they all have to be read together and reconciled, if we
14 can do it.
15 In Campbell I in the 1995 decision the Court
16 said this: "In view of this determination that an
17 education system is a function of state control, it would
18 be paradoxical to permit disparity because of local
19 control. Although the parties recognize this, they
20 suggest local control is a constitutionally recognized
21 interest, and therefore, a compelling state interest.
22 "This contention puzzles us," the Court said,
23 "since under Washakie there cannot be both state and local
24 control in establishing a constitutional educational
25 system. Still, the parties' contention indicate their
104
1 belief that some local role exists. Our previous
2 examination of the present statutory framework which the
3 legislature has enacted, clearly demonstrates state
4 control and so we examine the constitutional history to
5 see if local control is a constitutionally recognized
6 interest. Historical analysis reveals that local control
7 is not a constitutionally recognized interest."
8 Now, the best that the Campbell I Court could
9 say about self-governance of Wyoming's school districts
10 was that -- and again I quote -- "the framers did not
11 prohibit a local role but left the nature and scope of
12 that local role to the discretion of the legislature."
13 That's Campbell I. And the last sentence I just
14 read to you I think is extremely important and I want to
15 underline it because it provides the rationale for solving
16 what I believe is a thorny problem regarding the
17 enhancement language.
18 Let's now skip to Campbell II. In Campbell II
19 decided this last February, and of course with regard to
20 capital construction it is submitted and under
21 consideration for possible revision as we speak -- but in
22 Campbell II the Court said, "Campbell I," the 1995
23 decision, "stated that local enhancement may also result
24 in substantive innovations which should be available to
25 all school districts as part of a proper education. The
105
1 definition of a proper education is not static and
2 necessarily will change. Should that change occur as a
3 result of local innovation, all students are entitled to
4 the benefit of that change as part of a cost-based
5 state-financed proper education."
6 Then the Court went on to say, "Campbell
7 discussed this concept after deciding the term "local
8 control" could mean only a local role in implementing a
9 legislatively defined proper education. Because school
10 districts felt strongly that state control might result in
11 dumbing down the education provided to students, Campbell
12 defined the state standard as the best we can do and then
13 provided for local enhancement to ensure that deciding
14 what a proper education was would remain dynamic and
15 continue to evolve.
16 "Regarding capital construction, Campbell
17 clearly allows a school district" -- and I'm going to
18 pause here to underline editorially that word "allows" --
19 "regarding cap con, Campbell clearly allows a school
20 district to build facilities considered innovative or
21 world class with money raised locally or by property tax
22 not subject to recapture under the constitutional
23 provision and then leaves it to the legislature to ensure
24 that type of local enhancement does not ultimately create
25 a disparity in equal education opportunity.
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1 "Campbell's discussion about a local role
2 contemplated that by requiring the legislature to define
3 and fund the proper education, the role of a local school
4 district would necessarily change from primarily deciding
5 how to pay for the proper education with inadequate funds
6 to the new and necessary role of raising funding for local
7 enhancement in order to assure innovation."
8 In the legal opinion that I'm going to provide
9 to the LSO hopefully next week I will make the point that
10 local enhancement to assure local innovation, the language
11 out of Campbell II, has to be read in light of
12 Campbell I's language which I read to you that the nature
13 and scope of the innovations and enhancements, if any, are
14 within the discretion of the Wyoming legislature.
15 If you read these two decisions together, what
16 do you get? You get the inescapable conclusion that the
17 Court has come down firmly and unequivocally for state
18 control of K through 12 education. The Court has also
19 said that if you allow enhancements, they can become a new
20 state standard which immediately becomes an entitlement to
21 every school district in the state of Wyoming.
22 So I associate myself with the remarks that
23 Senator Coe made earlier.
24 Does that answer that issue?
25 COCHAIR DEVIN: I think so. To the extent
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1 that you feel comfortable asking, does the committee have
2 any questions?
3 Yes.
4 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair, Ray,
5 if the legislature chose to limit local enhancements, how
6 does that play out with the Supreme Court's stated
7 objective of local enhancements?
8 MR. HUNKINS: Well, I think that the
9 argument is this: Campbell I said that enhancements were
10 allowed. Campbell II said that, too.
11 Campbell I said that the matter of local bonding
12 and enhancements is entirely within the discretion of the
13 legislature. Campbell II didn't say that. Campbell II
14 didn't overrule that concept, and in fact, used the
15 permissive term "allowed" in describing what school
16 districts could do.
17 So Campbell II in my reading of it doesn't stand
18 for the proposition that every school district in the
19 state of Wyoming, all 48 of them, have an entitlement to
20 build a planetarium if Campbell County School District I
21 can build a planetarium because it enhances the study of
22 astrology. I don't think it stands for that.
23 I don't think the Supreme Court was saying that
24 a local group, locally elected to govern a local school
25 district, can dictate to the Wyoming legislature and the
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1 citizens of this state what -- with judicial approval what
2 the state's funding is going to be used for.
3 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chairman,
4 may I follow up?
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
6 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: So does it make
7 sense, then, that local enhancements in a sense need to be
8 defined because if they're undefined, they can create
9 disparities?
10 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, yes. I think
11 one option that certainly would need to be looked at is
12 whether or not the Wyoming legislature in its wisdom is
13 going to even get into allowing enhancements in
14 facilities.
15 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair, how
16 about enhancements in programs that are offered? That's
17 where the initiative comes in.
18 MR. HUNKINS: You have a great danger in
19 the Campbell II language which allows school districts to
20 make decisions about a very small handful of programs and
21 then orders the legislature to fund it.
22 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair, Ray,
23 it seems to me that we're in a catch-22 where we want to
24 allow initiatives in education to improve the education
25 that our children get, but the initiatives that we try and
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1 promote continue -- I mean, it could be exponential, and
2 the funding that goes along with that.
3 So, I mean, is that something we just have to
4 accept, if we want to promote initiatives it is going to
5 balloon the budget or what do we do?
6 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, in my opinion,
7 the Supreme Court has provided you with the answer, a
8 self-defense mechanism, and that is the language I read
9 that you're in control. You, the Wyoming legislature, are
10 in control of Wyoming K through 12 education. You may
11 choose for whatever reason not to exercise that control or
12 to delegate it to local school districts or
13 superintendents or whoever, but that's your decision.
14 And I think the Court's decision is that it is
15 your decision to make and if you don't want to abrogate
16 that responsibility or don't want to shift it onto another
17 group, you don't have to.
18 COCHAIR DEVIN: President Coe, and then
19 Senator Cathcart.
20 SENATOR COE: I don't know what I was
21 going to ask. I do recall, as we have these new projects
22 coming forward and we have one this afternoon, would it be
23 your opinion we have to be very, very cautious as to what
24 we sign onto now that we set a precedent that becomes a
25 standard out there that we'll be forced to live up to
110
1 after they finalize their decision and work on it into the
2 future? Do we need to be careful about setting that
3 precedent out there?
4 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, Senator Coe,
5 absolutely, I fully subscribe to that. The language that
6 I read suggests that one person's enhancement can become
7 another person's entitlement and you folks are in charge
8 of, you know, writing the checks and that seems to me to
9 be a blank check.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: Senator Cathcart, did you
11 have a question?
12 SENATOR CATHCART: Well, Madam Chair,
13 regarding enhancements, Mr. Hunkins, Wyoming is made up of
14 a lot of small communities and oftentimes a school is
15 often the social hub of a community. In some cases --
16 there are all kinds of examples -- gymnasiums, swimming
17 pools, auditoriums. Let's say, for example, a district
18 with 550 students needs an auditorium but the community
19 also needs, let's say, a civic center.
20 If the community contributes to the auditorium
21 and it becomes a multi-purpose facility, it can be used
22 for a school auditorium or a civic center, but the seating
23 capacity is twice that allowed for that size of a school,
24 does that become an enhancement, then, that potentially
25 every school district in the state is entitled to an
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1 auditorium with that seating capacity?
2 It is real fuzzy to me where you can have a
3 multiple use facility used by the community and therefore
4 appropriately funded by the community but also is a
5 substitute for a school auditorium. How much trouble are
6 we going to be in when we start entertaining that sort of
7 interaction between communities and schools?
8 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, I've been in a
9 lot of those schools. They're part of the great way of
10 life we have in Wyoming. They do provide the center for
11 community activities to communities that wouldn't have
12 those centers without the schools.
13 The language suggests that that's a risk, that
14 if you allow an enhancement for whatever good reason, and
15 I use the example of a planetarium -- I don't have
16 anything against planetariums and I expect that there are
17 a lot of serious studies that goes on in the astronomical
18 field. But it is a question of prioritization, I
19 suppose -- is that an enhancement that the state can
20 afford in every school in every community? And I think
21 the same thing is true with auditoriums.
22 And maybe the legislature in its wisdom
23 developed some guidelines about auditorium seating
24 capacity and communities of certain sizes and gives us a
25 record that we can defend on the basis of a compelling
112
1 state interest.
2 But I don't want to diminish the cautionary note
3 because the language of the opinion suggests that if you
4 do that for one school, you do it for all schools.
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: Well, Mr. Hunkins, I guess
6 that leads me to the question because when you say that,
7 I'm sitting on the finance side looking at the fact that
8 we have done certain things for small schools and now
9 we're being told in terms of utilities and so forth we
10 must either stop doing it in that manner or we must do it
11 for all.
12 And so I'm not sure that -- I guess I feel
13 uncomfortable that size of a community is going to buy us
14 that much grace with the Court, that they're going to
15 accept that we allow something -- which essentially is
16 what we did, we allowed something in really small areas
17 and small communities which was generally not accepted.
18 And I guess I had hesitancy that we take the cap
19 con committee down that road. Although it might make
20 common sense, it doesn't appear it is making legal sense.
21 And that concerns me. Because it seems reasonable I want
22 to find a way to do that, but every time we do that it
23 hasn't worked.
24 MR. HUNKINS: Well, the Attorney General's
25 Office, Madam Chair, is charged with the responsibility of
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1 defending your work product, and that's what we'll do
2 regardless of what that work product is, but we're looking
3 prospectively now at how it might make the task easier.
4 And I agree, and I hope I said it clearly, that
5 when you allow enhancements, whatever they are, they can
6 become entitlements for every school district in the
7 state.
8 COCHAIR DEVIN: Well, and that's -- I
9 mean, we have localized on this committee to capital
10 construction issues, but that is an issue for programs
11 also which is a bitter pill for us to, I think, accept,
12 for many of us who have promoted innovation to realize,
13 that that line has been drawn so narrow.
14 Representative Baker, you had a --
15 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: I believe the
16 question has been answered. Thank you.
17 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mr. Cochair.
18 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chair, Ray, it
19 could -- and define enhancements. Could cost be
20 determined to be an enhancement? I mean, right now we're
21 looking at 160 square feet per student or so. If a school
22 in fact came in and built one with 250 square foot, could
23 that become the standard even though it was above the
24 state standard? We're looking at a situation right now,
25 with a proposal, could the court come back and say this
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1 school built 250 square feet per student, that becomes the
2 state standard? Is that a possibility?
3 MR. HUNKINS: It is certainly a
4 possibility. It is hard to predict that it would come
5 about, but I've learned not to be surprised by school
6 financial decisions.
7 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Robinson.
8 REPRESENTATIVE ROBINSON: One of the
9 things, Madam Chairman, I guess that I haven't heard
10 discussed a lot in enhancements with facilities -- and I
11 have been at meetings about the budgets that will be
12 discussed later -- when something appears that it should
13 be a community and possibly a joint effort with a
14 community and a school, we've talked a lot about the
15 initial cost of building something that is much greater in
16 one area or much larger than it is in the other, but there
17 hasn't been much discussion on who assumes the final
18 responsibility of the upkeep of that facility over time or
19 the added costs for, say, the utilities and different
20 things that are added.
21 And it appears to me in a lot of these cases
22 that because that is an oversight that it is going to fall
23 on the school finance part of it. And to me it seems that
24 in some of these cases with auditoriums and swimming pools
25 and planetariums, whatever, that are a community facility
115
1 that is for the good of all of the community, in addition
2 to the children, that the answer would be for the
3 community to take responsibility for those facilities and
4 it would be their responsibility from then on.
5 We as the state paying for the school facilities
6 wouldn't be strapped with that forever just because we
7 said, okay, it is going to initially cost this much more
8 to build this facility. The long term of that could be
9 really a tough one for us to continue paying for forever.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: Well, and I think that's
11 very true. But then we have the interplay with the fact
12 that if the community doesn't care for it to the extent
13 that it would keep our building in good condition, then
14 the state's requirement to come back in, if those are
15 common facilities for the school, and maintain them in
16 good condition. The interaction is multiple and very
17 difficult to sort out.
18 Senator Massie, you had a question.
19 SENATOR MASSIE: Madam Chair, the other
20 end of the Supreme Court decision, the other committee you
21 chair that's dealing with is the basket of educational
22 goods and services. It seems to me perhaps what the
23 Supreme Court was saying, when an improvement goes from an
24 enhancement to an entitlement is when that particular
25 element provides a greater opportunity for the
116
1 opportunities to that basket of educational goods and
2 services.
3 So, for instance, using one of the elements in
4 that educational basket of goods and services is that a
5 student has to have three years of science, for instance,
6 in order to get a diploma. If a school says, "Well, that
7 science is going to be physics, biology and chemistry,"
8 and another school builds a facility for astronomy and
9 they say over here it is going to be biology, chemistry,
10 astronomy, that has not enhanced anyone's opportunity to
11 the educational basket of goods and services because
12 science is science and they can each have an option now to
13 choose, just like the size of the swimming pool with
14 regard to recreation.
15 On the other hand, if a district goes out and
16 does an enhancement and says we're going to experiment
17 with the size of classrooms and the size of classes, and
18 later on it is demonstrated that that experiment leads to
19 greater achievement and higher scores on WYCAS and in
20 other areas, then that perhaps has become entitlement
21 because it has afforded greater opportunity to the basket.
22 I think if we were to use the basket of
23 educational goods and services and criteria, that may help
24 us differentiate as to what is enhancement and what is
25 entitlement if we decide to go down that road.
117
1 COCHAIR DEVIN: Let's see. I think,
2 Representative Simpson, did you have a question?
3 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Just a brief
4 question about ownership issues here between a school and
5 community. Can a school share ownership with a community?
6 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, that's a very
7 good question. And when I was listening to Representative
8 Robinson ask about some of these things and also Senator
9 Cathcart's observation about the importance of auditoriums
10 and gyms to local communities, I thought of two things
11 which are in place now which might be worth your
12 consideration.
13 I remember back in the 1970s, I think, the
14 Wyoming legislature passed legislation which allowed
15 school districts to sponsor parks and recreation
16 districts. Do you remember that? It was -- I'm not an
17 expert in this area and I haven't looked at it in a long
18 time, but I know we've got a swimming pool in Wheatland
19 that was paid for with park and recreation funds which was
20 a function of a local school board making a decision about
21 what was needed in the community in the way of parks and
22 recreation.
23 There's no suggestion in these school finance
24 decisions that that is or could be an entitlement.
25 The other thought that comes to mind, because
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1 before I was a school finance lawyer I was a construction
2 litigation lawyer, as you know and all over this state we
3 have joint powers boards with two units of local
4 government combined to build a facility or provide for a
5 need. And I have been involved in lots of litigation
6 involving joint powers boards. There's never even been a
7 contention that that structure, that model, is
8 unconstitutional or that it might provide some kind of an
9 entitlement if, for instance, the community of Pine Bluffs
10 and the Laramie County School District Number 2 were to
11 join into a joint powers board to build an auditorium that
12 could be used by both the community and the school
13 district for joint purposes.
14 And I'm thinking out loud here, but those are
15 two things that came to mind when you all were mentioning
16 these issues.
17 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Thanks.
18 SENATOR CATHCART: Madam Chair.
19 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
20 SENATOR CATHCART: Just to follow up on
21 that exact example, let's say the school only has 550
22 students and the auditorium is built to accommodate 1100,
23 maybe twice the seating capacity required for the school.
24 I have a problem trying to figure out how that's an
25 enhancement to the school if you can seat all of the
119
1 students in there and on school activities there's just
2 going to be 550 vacant seats.
3 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, what you're
4 suggesting, Senator, what the Supreme Court would do if
5 faced with a contention by a competing or complaining
6 school district that, by gosh, Pine Bluffs has got a
7 700-seat auditorium and the advisory committee turned down
8 a 700-seat auditorium for us.
9 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Baker.
10 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Yes, Madam Chair,
11 mine would be not a follow-up but beginning a new
12 direction.
13 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I just want the last
14 question.
15 COCHAIR DEVIN: All right. Well, then
16 we'll give this one to Representative Baker.
17 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: In a new direction
18 in new construction does the Supreme Court decision
19 prohibit any of the local match requirements that could be
20 brought about by the legislature in -- I would use the
21 example, there's three or four in here that are based on
22 the wealth of district, so it is a requirement that then
23 every district would be somewhat similarly tapped, if you
24 will, as far as the tax requirement per individual or
25 something like that.
120
1 But does this Supreme Court decision totally
2 prohibit any local participation in new construction or
3 capital needs in a school district?
4 MR. HUNKINS: Madam Chair, Representative
5 Baker, I don't think it could fairly be said that it
6 absolutely prohibits any local involvement in new
7 construction. I think the Court has said that that's
8 allowed, that that can be allowed.
9 The question, I think, is not so much a legal
10 question, because I come down firmly legally on the side
11 of you can allow it if you want to, but you're not
12 required by any of the school finance decisions to allow
13 it.
14 The question is more a policy question and
15 recognizing the risk that somebody's enhancement can
16 become an entitlement.
17 COCHAIR DEVIN: Representative Baker, I
18 didn't get the impression you were talking about an
19 enhancement.
20 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: I'm not. I'm
21 stepping into a new area.
22 COCHAIR DEVIN: You're talking about
23 basic --
24 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: I'm talking about
25 basic construction of, let's say, a building that scores
121
1 40 on the system. The determination is we need a new
2 school building up there. It is going to be just a basic
3 building. Can we have the local match requirement based
4 upon the wealth of that district to meet that need?
5 MR. HUNKINS: No.
6 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: There's a total
7 prohibition in spite of the fact they may not have
8 maintained the buildings as well?
9 MR. HUNKINS: Yes.
10 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Oh, shoot.
11 MR. HUNKINS: Sorry.
12 COCHAIR DEVIN: I see no other hands. I
13 think you get the last question.
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chairman, we've
15 been too polite to ask this today. When is your best
16 guess when we will get something from the Court?
17 MR. HUNKINS: My best guess was the end of
18 July.
19 COCHAIR DEVIN: Second-best guess.
20 MR. HUNKINS: July, a month ago.
21 COCHAIR SHIVLER: You think they're any
22 closer but --
23 MR. HUNKINS: My sense is that it is
24 imminent. My sense is that they're struggling for some
25 reason, but they haven't invited me into their conference
122
1 so I don't know what it is. But they could have said no
2 in a big hurry to our petition for rehearing. They
3 haven't done that.
4 COCHAIR DEVIN: I thank you. We've taken
5 you almost 15 minutes past when you needed to leave.
6 Committee, the -- we will break for lunch. My
7 cochair insists you be back at 1:15. I would have given
8 you more time. So we will reconvene at 1:15. We do have
9 a fair amount of business this afternoon and we want to
10 finish up in this one-day agenda for those of you who will
11 not be staying for tomorrow.
12 (Recess taken 12:15 p.m. and reconvened
13 1:25 p.m., August 30, 2001.)
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think we'll reconvene.
15 Representative Simpson, I'm sure, will be back
16 from the mall soon.
17 I think this morning's discussion and testimony
18 was very enlightening and certainly appropriate for the
19 time. I think a lot of us had these questions and some of
20 them have been answered. I would like to continue where
21 we left off. I think we were over on enhancements and
22 actually we just finished governance and were working our
23 way into enhancements.
24 MR. CURRY: Yes, Mr. Chairman, I think
25 that Mr. Hunkins provided a really great service to the
123
1 committee in his discussion of enhancements and it is
2 really clear that in the process that is outlined there
3 needs to be special attention given to the treatment -- to
4 the definition of enhancements and the role of -- relative
5 to program so as not to stifle innovation but to not buy
6 into an open-ended process of changing the standards and
7 guidelines.
8 So in that sense just as establishment of a
9 priority system, this is all bound up in the processes
10 that ought to be used once you decide -- once the Court's
11 decision has been made and you make certain decisions as
12 to whether, in fact, as Senator Coe has postulated, this
13 is going to be state operated and state controlled or if
14 some other arrangement seems to be feasible, once you hear
15 back from the Court.
16 I was wondering -- not to restrict discussion,
17 but I was wondering if it would be the pleasure of the
18 committee, that based upon the conversations that we've
19 had today, if you would like us to weave these particular
20 points relative to the elements of the process and
21 priority setting and enhancements and budgets and the like
22 and put together a think piece that would say, you know,
23 based upon our understanding, knowledge and research this
24 is what we think, as a starting point, so that then at
25 your next meeting you could say we like this idea, we
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1 really don't like that idea, we think we ought to go a
2 different way as opposed to -- I mean, we've had a good
3 discussion of some of these questions here and we've
4 gotten a lot out of them, and if there's some other things
5 we ought to talk about, perhaps we should, but maybe the
6 next thing for us to do would be to get back to you with a
7 discussion piece.
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Some of us have had this
9 discussion just in the last few minutes, primarily to ask
10 Dave Nelson to lay out what he would perceive would be a
11 good system based on our water development -- you know,
12 the way it is laid out, how it would work within the scope
13 of capital construction, school capital construction.
14 Possibly if we were going to -- we want to talk
15 to the committee about this to see if they're in agreement
16 with it, and if in fact they are, I think it would be good
17 if you did the same thing. And it would be two different
18 proposals.
19 MR. CURRY: Or we could bring them
20 together?
21 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Would you like them to
22 bring them together or for us to bring them together?
23 Personally I would like to see what the options were. You
24 folks would have your proposal and they would write it
25 based on our water development.
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1 SENATOR CATHCART: Mr. Chairman, you know,
2 if we ask for a proposed bill draft it is obviously not
3 going to be the finished product, but we need someplace to
4 start. And if we ask Dave to do us a bill draft that is
5 something like a water department look-alike thing and
6 their ideas can be easily amended into any discussions we
7 have, I think certainly they'll have some great ideas.
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: And you folks have the
9 benefit of seeing what is going on in other parts of the
10 nation and, you know, this paper that we just got was a
11 big help and very enlightening, by the way, what the
12 State's positions were on capital construction.
13 MR. CURRY: And we will continue to update
14 that, Mr. Chairman.
15 SENATOR COE: Mr. Chairman, I would like
16 to see -- and I hope the rest of the committee does do,
17 see something at the next meeting we do have in draft
18 form. Realizing it is the 1st of September and the people
19 down the street haven't got their act together yet, maybe
20 for a long time they haven't had their act together, but
21 have something that we have taken really serious
22 consideration of at our next meeting, actually see some
23 bills, actually put it into form that we can start looking
24 at stuff now and jump start this process and take it in
25 and get it going.
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1 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Is the committee in
2 agreement with that? Is there anyone --
3 COCHAIR DEVIN: Chairman Shivler, I guess
4 I would ask to be a little more specific for Dave and the
5 process that was discussed this morning perhaps going with
6 a Select Committee of legislators and then a K through 12
7 cap con maintenance separate entity much like the water
8 development office and perhaps not have to do that third
9 layer of the citizen commission, but we might have to
10 figure out how that all fits in later, whether it is the
11 advisory committee we get that input or where we do, where
12 that all fits.
13 I would think that it would be possible to do it
14 just like when you come to where do we place it, do we
15 place it in the department, do we place it separate, do we
16 place it in the department but at arm's length; that those
17 could be listed as option points, three options we could
18 take more time to discuss the next time.
19 And if in the organization of how you would put
20 together the duties and phases of this in terms of needs,
21 planning, review, et cetera, that process, if that's
22 needed for the draft bill, I certainly wouldn't mind
23 seeing that amount, that collaboration, MGT helping them
24 to make suggestions on organizing what parts you would put
25 in what phases.
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1 I don't think that would preclude you from doing
2 a think paper that would help us on concepts of the whole
3 issue.
4 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, that sounds
5 fine. And what we could do is to support Dave in that
6 kind of substantive part of duties and responsibilities
7 and then put together a little piece explaining why we
8 think these things are appropriate and what other options,
9 major options might be, if that would work.
10 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Massie.
11 SENATOR MASSIE: One other point I was
12 going to raise this morning, and if we're going to do a
13 bill draft we might want to throw something in and that is
14 in dealing with other states that have citizen legislators
15 how they handle emergency requests while the legislature
16 is out of session with regard to getting funding that is
17 needed right away.
18 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Madam Chair.
19 COCHAIR DEVIN: Chairman Shivler is in
20 charge this afternoon.
21 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Good afternoon.
22 Sorry I was late. Traffic was terrible.
23 I would be interested in hearing more about the
24 Water Development Commission's planning division and the
25 stage 1, stage 2, because as I understand it, those
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1 projects, when they're identified, they get into the
2 pipeline and they can be in the pipeline for a number of
3 years, really, for a variety of reasons.
4 And I suspect that could be the same with school
5 construction, depending on the immediacy of the need. So
6 I for one would like to hear more about that or read
7 something about how that is done and what criteria they
8 use and the forms that they use as far as applications and
9 those types of things. Maybe that would help us out, too.
10 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mr. Curry, say you're
11 not -- you only have read the law as far as --
12 MR. CURRY: That's correct, Mr. Chairman.
13 COCHAIR SHIVLER: At our last meeting a
14 gentleman came and went through that. He made a good
15 presentation to us, I thought. And I think most of us
16 have an idea of how it would -- certainly preliminary idea
17 of how it works. I haven't been on the water development
18 as has Senator Cathcart, but I think that, you know, that
19 certainly could be a workable format.
20 I see construction of schools a little different
21 than, you know, water development, but by the same token,
22 I think that the Department of Education has done a
23 survey, they require the preliminary survey they send out
24 to schools when they're going to build a new school that
25 does a lot of that preliminary work. Granted, that's done
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1 by the district.
2 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, there is a
3 parallel process -- not that I fully understand the water
4 development, but just in the idea of stage 1, stage 2,
5 there is what is called a predesign process where a lot of
6 things are laid out before you go to actual drawings so
7 you have a basis for cost estimation, you know what is
8 included. So you've taken the need and the planning to a
9 point where you have something that you can discuss
10 budgetarily. You don't have the actual design and it
11 serves as the basis whether to go ahead to authorize the
12 preparation of plans and final specifications which would
13 be kind of a stage 2 level.
14 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman,
15 maybe it would be most helpful to have a flow chart or
16 outline of that process.
17 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think that would.
18 Mr. Hayes has done that over in the Department of
19 Education. I don't know the extent of the flow chart but
20 you have done the outline that we send out and have the
21 schools fill out; is that correct?
22 MR. HAYES: Mr. Chair, that's correct.
23 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think we got a copy of
24 that in the mail and I read through that and that is
25 fairly comprehensive. When it comes back to the DOE, it
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1 gives an idea of what the schools are, perceived needs
2 are, and a lot was involved. For that we asked for
3 initially what the population is, was it going up and
4 down. There was a lot of information and it was fairly
5 concise. As you recall, one of the applications we got
6 was this high from the floor and no one would read. And
7 essentially what this does is give us the same information
8 in about 70 or 80 pages.
9 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, I
10 was referring to more of a flow chart for me. That does
11 exist but maybe just covering the overall process from the
12 initiation through final completion of construction and
13 maybe that would be a two-page document, but at least then
14 I have an idea of what the process is and what points
15 there are that we need to address more than --
16 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think --
17 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Maybe it is all
18 existing already.
19 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mr. Hayes, that's been
20 done, the flow chart?
21 MR. HAYES: Mr. Chair, that's correct.
22 That's right, we do have this. That's it.
23 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mr. Chairman, I guess the
24 one piece that may not be a part of that flow chart, and I
25 don't know that, but we may want to get the process more
131
1 sophisticatedly integrated would be that multi-year
2 districtwide facility planning piece get plugged in here
3 so that you have the cap con department working with the
4 districts to get that piece so that we have some idea that
5 the major maintenance that was reasonable had been done.
6 Because we kind of start at the point of, gee, I
7 need a new school or major renovation, and I think this
8 committee is in hopes we can start ahead of that point
9 where we're talking about the multi-year plan and then we
10 get eventually this major maintenance piece built into it
11 so that when we come with actual building or renovation
12 requests we know where we're at.
13 And we've got a constant circular -- I think
14 someone used the process this morning about, you know,
15 there's a cadence of a project but there's also this
16 circular communication and use of this piece, so it will
17 be fairly involved.
18 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, Senator Devin,
19 you're absolutely right, and the process -- in fact, the
20 idea that's been running around in my mind is that both
21 your long-range major facilities plan and your long-term
22 major maintenance plan get cross-referenced to identify
23 deficiencies so that these things are all tied together so
24 that -- and also I think in terms of identification of
25 proposed enhancements.
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1 So that these are not -- so that there's
2 nothing -- oh, gosh, I didn't know that was happening, so
3 that everything is really laid out in a manner that can be
4 understood up front and the like.
5 So if I understand you correctly, in the paper
6 that we'll do we'll lay out a flow chart that would kind
7 of capsulize the process that we're suggesting?
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Any questions.
9 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Mr. Chairman.
10 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Representative Baker.
11 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: In response to
12 answers from legal counsel this morning local
13 participation in ongoing building projects is apparently a
14 thing of the past. If there's one aspect that we as a
15 responsible entity lose control over it would be where it
16 goes back into the architectural phase.
17 And I don't want to step on Mr. Chairman's toes,
18 but -- but suddenly we're -- there's a segment here of
19 expectation that gets built into a community and
20 expectation that gets built in a board over X, Y, Z
21 building a building. We're seeing this currently
22 happening in the emergency building projects and what's
23 occurring now.
24 Would you have an opinion about whether that
25 architectural phase ought to be done with local control if
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1 we're going to have the responsibility for fairness, equal
2 delivery of the basket?
3 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, Representative
4 Baker, first of all -- before I stick my foot in
5 something, first of all, it is a crucial question as to
6 who is the owner. Traditionally the owner has been the
7 district because the district has been the instigator of
8 the project and they receive assistance toward its end.
9 If the State is the owner, then the owner
10 traditionally either selects or has a strong hand in the
11 selection process of the design professional.
12 A number of states, some models that come to my
13 mind in Idaho, there the selection team is made up by a
14 combination of representatives from the operating -- from
15 the school and from whatever state agency that's in
16 charge.
17 In Washington where I live in many cases for
18 community colleges -- now different situation than for the
19 local districts because they are the owner, but for
20 community colleges the state department of general
21 administration plays an active role in the planning
22 process and in the scoping and in the selection of the
23 architect. But they also do it in consultation with the
24 college.
25 So there are some models here that present
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1 themselves that could still allow input from the local
2 community and presence of your assigned agency, which is
3 responsible. And ultimately you, you, representing the
4 state of Wyoming, are the owner of those buildings --
5 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Mr. Chairman.
6 MR. CURRY: -- according to what I
7 interpret Ray to have said.
8 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: I have talked with
9 individual school districts, just a few that are -- I
10 wouldn't say this is comprehensive -- and I've asked, when
11 you have a major structural deficiency in your district
12 how would you like it handled?
13 And a surprising number of them said, "We're in
14 the job of education. We're not in the job of building
15 schools. I would like to step back, have somebody come in
16 and fix my problem." That did surprise me. That did
17 surprise me.
18 But there does seem to be -- at least at some
19 level there is that feeling amongst school administrators,
20 anyway, "I don't want to fool with this. I would just as
21 soon the State would step in and fix my problem."
22 Now, once it is fixed, I know who the complaint
23 is going to come from, but that's just an observation.
24 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Representative Anderson.
25 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you. I guess
135
1 my feeling being a member of this committee is a little
2 different than being a parent. I always wanted the best
3 for my children but I always wanted the best I could
4 afford, and there was that element of restraint there. I
5 think I feel the same. We want the best for the children
6 of Wyoming, but we want the best we can afford.
7 Whether this be direction to you or direction to
8 someone else, I would like to see us be able to determine
9 some economies and some efficiencies and provide some
10 incentives maybe for local planners and local government
11 that are involved with these, and educators as well, just
12 to receive some sort of incentive or some sort of
13 recognition for efficiency, economy, certainly
14 effectiveness to bring it into line.
15 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, in
16 terms of contracting, I don't necessarily see that the
17 State has to be the owner. I would think the districts
18 would be the owners and it would be up to the district as
19 to how much they would want to be involved in the design
20 and construction phases of it.
21 But I would envision standard specifications as
22 far as square footage, the type of pipe that you use, the
23 specific building materials for a particular job which are
24 the specifications created by the engineer and the
25 architect on a particular job, and within that realm or
136
1 scope of specifications, then the local entities can get
2 together with the architect and say, you know, this is how
3 many students are projected, this is the square footage we
4 would have, help us put it together into something that we
5 like and the community likes.
6 I mean, I think there's a great deal of
7 opportunity for local input there but you have those
8 parameters that are set and they know that they can't
9 build over 165 square feet per student and the class sizes
10 ought to be this and that type of things. And then the
11 school districts are like any other special district or
12 quasi-governmental agency in Wyoming, where they can
13 certainly own the building, but it is paid for by the
14 State, I would think.
15 SENATOR COE: Mr. Chairman, I think -- a
16 follow-up to that, I think that's fine if you go with
17 local resources, especially outsourced locally. I go back
18 to what you said earlier, if you don't give them a budget
19 to work with, you have no control over it.
20 SENATOR CATHCART: Mr. Chairman, that's
21 what I was going to add to Representative Simpson's
22 comments. I think before you go to the architect with
23 this to develop a plan, we can obviously know how much
24 square foot we need, how many classrooms and all of that,
25 but then also up front, "This is our budget restriction.
137
1 This is how much the State allows based on today's cost
2 per square foot, so build whatever you can with that money
3 that satisfies the need," but we need the architect to
4 know he's on a budget.
5 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I was going to ask that
6 question. We were talking about Idaho. Does that level
7 where that happens at that state level -- do they
8 determine or offer a budget?
9 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, not in advance.
10 The budget isn't set until the proposal is made since
11 there's no -- in those instances there is not that
12 level -- in fact, the state has a very, very, very small
13 assistance program to local school districts. The process
14 I was describing deals with colleges and universities and
15 the budget isn't set until the proposal emerges from the
16 planning process. There aren't any predetermined -- you
17 have this many square feet, average cost per square foot,
18 et cetera -- that I think Senator Cathcart was talking
19 about, you know, up-front guidelines that would be set.
20 So in those cases it just emerges and then you
21 get into the -- the pushing and tugging process of
22 reconciliation of desire versus practical reality.
23 COCHAIR SHIVLER: One of the issues that
24 concerns me, and I know it does other committee members,
25 is there has to be a way to establish what is a fair
138
1 square foot cost. I mean, you know, there's a lot of
2 construction going on now. Building schools is not a new
3 thing. They're building all around us, all across the
4 nation, and we have to, I feel, look at those figures to
5 determine what our costs are going to be.
6 And as we get a little further into this
7 afternoon, Senator Cathcart and I are going to give you
8 some figures that are pretty astounding. I think you've
9 already seen them. I have a heart problem and it was
10 really taxing.
11 So I think we need to have it in the beginning,
12 saying look, we can't design 350-square-foot schools where
13 in Idaho they're building for 110 and Colorado for 115.
14 In other words, around us they're doing that and the
15 excuse is always we're special, we're different here.
16 Well, everybody is different, every state is different.
17 So we need, I think, some idea what are the real
18 costs to date of a school. And I know it is available.
19 We have R.S. Means and we can look at that and that's a
20 very -- you know, I think that's a good organization.
21 They're very reputable.
22 MR. CURRY: And, Mr. Chairman, those data
23 on school construction costs are collected by national
24 organizations and averages are there by region of the
25 country and by level of school.
139
1 COCHAIR SHIVLER: So I think the question
2 we need to ask ourselves, are we above that? Can we
3 justify being three times that? And that's where we are
4 right now, I believe.
5 MR. TEATER: Mr. Chairman, I think what
6 I'm hearing you say is as we come back to you folks with
7 this process or suggested process, would you like to see
8 that component built into it?
9 COCHAIR SHIVLER: You know, I've tried to
10 put it together myself and I have some information and
11 when I give the information to somebody, they say, "Well,
12 it can't possibly be that low." And yet I got it from the
13 construction department over in Colorado, Department of
14 Education, construction.
15 MR. TEATER: Whatever that number is, I
16 think that ceiling needs to be part of the process.
17 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think so. We need to
18 have an idea, if they come forward with 500 students, what
19 it is going to cost us. Now it is a crapshoot. We have
20 no idea. It could be anywhere from a hundred to 400 a
21 square foot.
22 Senator Massie.
23 SENATOR MASSIE: Mr. Chairman, I agree
24 that we need to have a budget up front. I would argue we
25 have some flexibility as we go through the process, some
140
1 room for negotiation. I could see some local
2 circumstances such as an area that's high probability of
3 earthquakes, high snowfall, even high populations of
4 students with disabilities that may have to have some
5 accommodations that we can't take into account initially.
6 I like the idea but I think that as long as we
7 realize it needs to be flexible and have some negotiation
8 in there.
9 COCHAIR SHIVLER: No, I agree with that.
10 COCHAIR DEVIN: And, Mr. Chairman, I guess
11 one other piece to the staff, as Representative Simpson
12 indicated, it may not matter who owns the building. We
13 may be able to work that out. But I do think this
14 committee has a question that some of you in the field
15 about who accepts the construction? Will this be a joint
16 process? Because I know there have been schools finished,
17 some of them right here in this town, that I was in when
18 they were almost immediately new and the buckets were on
19 the floor catching water then.
20 So I think there is an issue of who and jointly
21 and how to accept the construction. I don't think we have
22 to settle it today, but I guess, Dave, from that
23 standpoint, in your draft if there are places that there
24 are questions or options --
25 MR. NELSON: Madam Chair, I think there
141
1 will be many questions and many blank spaces that you all
2 will have to fill in.
3 COCHAIR DEVIN: I guess there will. And I
4 guess maybe that would help us focus on what we need to
5 do, if you just feel -- you know, point those out as we go
6 along, as you go along in the drafting. We will have to
7 discuss them. But -- because ultimately, if you've got --
8 the state of Idaho, for example, may be under control
9 because they must pass local bond levies in order to meet
10 certain criteria to get local assistance.
11 So there's the local piece we're missing with
12 the court decision to control those costs. And from that
13 standpoint, you know, we've got to -- if you accept
14 construction that should not be accepted, ultimately the
15 major maintenance and the utility and all of that will
16 fall to the State and the eventual repair of it, if we are
17 not careful, that we're a judicial part of that process.
18 MR. TEATER: Mr. Chairman, just a point of
19 information, the State of Idaho is also going through a
20 school facility lawsuit that involves hundreds of millions
21 of dollars of unmet needs as well, so...
22 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Cathcart.
23 SENATOR CATHCART: Mr. Chairman, under the
24 scenario we're talking about like a water development
25 look-alike situation, I think in that case we have very
142
1 little expertise and if we ever do, it is just by chance,
2 construction-type expertise on any school board. Having
3 been through a construction process with our little
4 district out here, I can assure you that they would agree
5 with Representative Baker's comments earlier. They just
6 wish somebody with knowledge in that area had overseen
7 their projects.
8 I think construction oversight needs to also be
9 included in the task of this group where we have some
10 construction expertise overseeing the contractors and the
11 construction work. We can't leave that to the local board
12 who rarely would have any expertise in that area. And I
13 think that should remain with the State to oversee that
14 construction.
15 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Representative Baker.
16 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Well, Mr. Chairman,
17 I agree with the senator, but I think the impact of that
18 needs to be emphasized. What is construction oversight
19 and what is appropriate construction oversight? If you
20 had four or five building construction -- school building
21 constructions going on at the same time, which we will
22 have probably that or more, it is going to take a crew.
23 It is not just one or two people.
24 SENATOR CATHCART: It is worth every penny
25 of it.
143
1 MR. CURRY: Mr. Chairman, one of the
2 options here -- and for your information, we do not do
3 this business. We try to do a lot of business but we
4 don't do construction management.
5 And one answer that large, complex school
6 districts have used is to hire professional construction
7 managers to make sure that projects stay on time and on
8 budget and that may be whoever ultimately has the
9 responsibility, if that is built in, if there's the
10 expectation that there will be professional project
11 management on the construction end, that would go a long
12 way to, I think, assuring that the money was appropriately
13 spent.
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Well, you know, going
15 back to the old days now, the architect had a component of
16 his fee as supervision. Also, builders were bonded. And
17 I'm assuming we bond our builders. That should take care
18 of the leaky roof and certainly any substandard
19 construction or design. And I don't think we've changed
20 that so I think that is something we demand, that we need
21 a bond on this job and also we would like the architect to
22 earn his 4, 5, 3 percent, whatever it is.
23 Dodds.
24 MR. CROMWELL: Mr. Chairman, another
25 process the committee might not be aware of that is
144
1 becoming more popular which is building commissioning.
2 All the systems in a building are actually commissioned
3 and shown to work as supposed to before the building was
4 turned over.
5 You would think this would be standard operating
6 procedure but it isn't. Before you get kids in that
7 building you make sure the HVAC systems are working,
8 control systems are working and you test all of the
9 systems. And that's another process that's becoming more
10 popular in the public arena.
11 SENATOR CATHCART: Back to the discussion
12 Representative Baker was having and the cost of having --
13 if you've got six projects going, you may need six people
14 out there. But an experience I had when we built the
15 county jail here, I was contractor on that and the County
16 actually hired a full-time employee to be on the job on
17 their behalf and he was the owner's representative on the
18 job.
19 This guy happened to be an architect from an
20 architectural firm here, he wasn't cheap, but I guarantee
21 you he was worth every penny they spent on him in savings
22 on change orders and that sort of thing when that job was
23 over because you had a very experienced person there
24 answering questions on behalf of the owner regarding
25 change orders and all of those sorts of things.
145
1 And in my opinion he was certainly well worth
2 the money we paid him and saved the County considerably on
3 that project.
4 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, we
5 should also keep in mind that the State has had some not
6 great successes building things like the north prison in
7 Rawlins, and there are some lessons to be learned from
8 that. I believe the State was the general contractor on
9 that job, if I recall correctly what I was told.
10 So there are all types of contracting issues
11 that -- we've explored some of those but there are more we
12 should explore further, too.
13 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I hope we never get into
14 the process of building schools, the State, I mean.
15 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: I hope so, too.
16 COCHAIR SHIVLER: That would be a
17 disaster.
18 Any more questions?
19 SENATOR COE: I would like a motion to --
20 (Discussion held).
21 COCHAIR SHIVLER: We appreciate your
22 information and your comments.
23 Mr. Curry, the next thing on the agenda is the
24 state financing options.
25 MS. GARLAND: Sharon Garland with the
146
1 state treasurer's office. And I'm here to introduce Keith
2 Curry and give you a little bit of background how he came
3 to be with the State.
4 About five years ago when the State was allowed
5 to invest in equities, the State Loan and Investment Board
6 contracted with an independent investment consultant who
7 is R.V. Kuhns and Associates which some of you who have
8 set on the committee on capital finance and investments
9 are familiar with.
10 And they were hired to assist the State Loan and
11 Investment Board, the treasurer's office and that Select
12 Committee on various oversight issues and the process has
13 worked quite well.
14 Last spring the governor expressed his interest
15 to R.V. Kuhns and Associates and to the treasurer's office
16 in providing a similar process in reviewing public finance
17 issues with the emphasis being on school capital
18 construction financing.
19 R.V. Kuhns was consulted on this. We had
20 several meetings and they indicated their expertise is in
21 investment consulting and not in the public finance area
22 and suggested that we contract with an independent public
23 finance advisor.
24 So the treasurer's office went out last May with
25 an RFP and the board selected the firm of Public Financial
147
1 Management, also known as PMF -- PFM -- excuse me. I
2 always say it backwards -- out of Newport Beach which is a
3 very large nationwide financial advisory firm which
4 Mr. Keith Curry is one of the top financial people
5 involved in that. And we have a one-year contract at this
6 point in time, which the treasurer's office is financing.
7 His primary duties are to analyze the balance
8 between pay-as-you-go financing, bond issuance and to look
9 at the lease/purchase financing that is statutorily
10 allowed for school capital construction.
11 He's also trying to develop a financial plan for
12 the various school district cap con projects, review and
13 analyze existing potential revenue streams that are
14 available for bond repayment.
15 Keith has begun that process and has worked with
16 the Capital Finance Committee, the Select Committee, and
17 has given a report earlier, just a couple weeks ago, and
18 he's here to just tell you a little bit about that
19 process, where he's at and maybe ask some questions of
20 this committee so that he can continue his work.
21 MR. KEITH CURRY: Thank you, Sharon,
22 members of the committee, thank you.
23 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I might ask, are you
24 related to the last Mr. Curry?
25 MR. KEITH CURRY: The good-looking
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1 Mr. Curry? No, I'm not. It has never happened before.
2 As Sharon indicated, Public Financial Management
3 is a national financial advisory firm. We're not
4 investment bankers, but we are about 215 people larger
5 than the public finance departments at Lehman Brothers,
6 Goldman Sachs, any of the major investment banks you see.
7 So far this year we've assisted on more than 200
8 financings for cities, counties and states across America,
9 totaling in excess of $12 billion. So we're in the
10 capital markets about three times a week on average and we
11 have about 3500 clients nationally, including several
12 states and several schools districts.
13 Let me just sort of begin by telling you how we
14 approach the issue here, and we're going to talk about how
15 we would address the Campbell decision, assuming that
16 there is no change. Now, I had an opportunity during the
17 morning to read the brief for the rehearing and I'm sure
18 you're all aware of the various weaknesses and
19 deficiencies of that decision and the difficult position
20 that it places the State in.
21 But we're going to assume right now that there
22 is no modification of the decision and we're going to talk
23 a little bit about how we would go about approaching
24 dealing with the mandate that's been set by the Court for
25 school construction.
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1 And of course the decision itself says, reading
2 on page 1, that by next July you must develop a six-year
3 plan to address these needs. They have prioritized them
4 for you. They've identified the first two years of needs,
5 the next two years of needs, and the final two years of
6 needs in increments and told you what to do first.
7 At the time that they did this estimate, it was
8 based on a $563 million estimate of costs based on a 1998
9 estimate. The State Department of Education has escalated
10 that to today's dollars and it is now $610 million. And
11 if you projected out over the six-year implementation
12 period beginning next July it is going to cost $708
13 million. So you really see that you have a very difficult
14 and burgeoning cost element going on here.
15 The decision, as you heard earlier this morning,
16 requires that capital expenses be funded through a
17 statewide equitable tax on all taxpayers and that the type
18 of tax is the prerogative of the legislature.
19 So now let's look at if we were going to meet
20 the court mandate in its literal sense and spend money in
21 accordance to the schedule that they've given us, what
22 would that look like.
23 If you look on page 2, you see in the first
24 column the base year which was done this year by the State
25 Department of Education where the numbers are inflated now
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1 up to $610 million, and you see the categories on the
2 left-hand side out of the MGT report.
3 Assuming that we began work on July 1, 2002, you
4 see going forward how those costs -- we simply took those
5 two years of priorities that the Court gave, just cut them
6 in half, spending one on one year and one on the next year
7 because they gave them to us in two-year ranges.
8 And you can see that that becomes a $98 million
9 requirement for the first two years, growing to $144
10 million in the next two years and $111 million in the
11 final two years or the six years of the schedule as
12 outlined by the Court in their decision. That's an
13 immense fiscal impact on the state of Wyoming.
14 The effect of inflation, as you can see, is
15 substantial. One of the key things you want to do is be
16 able to, if you will, get credit for expenditures against
17 that $563 million. And we're going to go back now and try
18 to document what expenditures have been made since 1998
19 through today that would reduce that number that the
20 State, if you will, can have credit for because of the
21 cost of inflation. And we've used a relatively low 3
22 percent inflation going forward. I've seen estimates much
23 higher here on school construction costs, are very
24 sobering.
25 You also see here the critical importance of the
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1 MGT numbers which are the base for the Court's decision in
2 terms of defining the need we have to address.
3 A couple of observations here. It would seem to
4 me that while the court case is still in pendency, that it
5 would be incumbent upon you or important to you to focus
6 your expenditures made in the interim on projects that
7 qualify under this list.
8 As you've talked about today, what should we be
9 doing now, I think you want to be reducing your exposure
10 under this decision by making sure any of the expenditures
11 you make qualify as part of the Court's mandate.
12 On the next page if we were to finance this $708
13 million, use debt financing as the technique to address
14 this need, when finished we would have done large bond
15 issues and the aggregate net would total about 43 and a
16 half million using 30-year bonds going forward.
17 I've spoken now three times here in the state
18 and every time I come here that number gets a little bit
19 bigger. And I apologize for that but it is true. It is
20 because now we have better figures and we're better able
21 to project when we're going to spend the money. We were
22 looking at $610 million. That number is about $39 million
23 if we finance it all today. But clearly we can't do that.
24 We have to spend it over the schedule.
25 Can the current school financing sources be
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1 redirected to meet the current need? I'll talk about that
2 in a second.
3 Should the current taxing authority of local
4 school districts be curtailed. We've talked about that
5 today. One of the things you as a state spend state money
6 on is on the local millage supplement, about $5 million
7 annually for that. Let me suggest to you until you
8 clarify where the Court is going you don't want to add to
9 that obligation because that is not necessarily crediting
10 you against your obligation created by the court.
11 Unless the whole school districts -- and you
12 heard the discussion today much more eloquently, I think,
13 than I could do about the implications of enhancements,
14 and I think that's a very difficult policy decision. It
15 breaches on local control but one that I think has a big
16 impact on the decisions you make in terms of how you
17 restructure school finance. The concept of the millage
18 supplement and local match and all of that I think
19 probably needs to be reviewed.
20 Finally, is a new revenue source needed to
21 enable the State to meet this obligation? We want to look
22 certainly at all the options available to us before we get
23 into a situation of recommending new revenues, new taxes.
24 Nobody likes to do that but it is a sobering number, as
25 you've seen, that we're trying to address.
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1 On the following page I thought it was helpful
2 to look at what are the revenues that have been used for
3 school construction over the last two years during the
4 current biennium. And as you can see, the bulk of those
5 have been co-lease bonus payments. Those are projected to
6 drop off to $9 million and not projected beyond $9
7 million, simply because they haven't been bid by the
8 federal government, we don't know what they're going to
9 be.
10 Let me also suggest because of that they're not
11 a truly well-suitable source for securing debt but they
12 have been the bulk of the monies that have been used for
13 school construction.
14 You will also see that $44 million from the
15 legislative royalty impact accounts has been allocated to
16 schools.
17 So from revenue sources you've been spending 43,
18 $46 million plus an additional, let's say, $22 million
19 over the two years, if you average it, about 60 some
20 million currently on school construction. And of course
21 within that is a $10 million mill levy subsidy, $5 million
22 per year on average.
23 On the following page, page 5 you see what the
24 hypothetical -- and this is hypothetical because it will
25 be different than this in actual reality. We don't know
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1 what you've already spent. The timing of the projects may
2 be different, but this is on the schedule that was in the
3 court decision and you can see debt service rises up to 43
4 and half million dollars.
5 Now the implication of that is that you would be
6 taking probably every dollar plus some because you have to
7 leave some aside for the mill levy supplement to meet the
8 Court decision. The Court has told you this is now your
9 capital plan for the foreseeable future. In fact, the
10 debt service would go out 30 years to meet those $700
11 million worth of needs.
12 Now, if you spent $43 million annually, by the
13 time you got to $700 million, it would be 16, 17, 18 years
14 down the line. So you're compressing a lot of needs
15 rapidly, getting them done, but it is still very expensive
16 and disruptive to how you have traditionally done business
17 in the area of school finance.
18 As you can see, there's a couple other
19 observations. We are suggesting that the efficient way of
20 doing this, if debt is a part of this, is to be done by
21 the State. We think that's consistent with the Court
22 decision as written and certainly consistent with the
23 testimony you've heard from others before me today.
24 We've talked about governance. My own sort of
25 conception of this is either the treasurer's office or
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1 school construction authority that would be created by the
2 legislature would be the issuer of the debt. So as you
3 think about duties for an entity certainly being
4 responsible as the issuing agent for the financing would
5 be an important role for that entity to play.
6 What are some of the revenue options for
7 financing the school construction requirement? I'm
8 certainly not here to recommend any tax increase at this
9 point but simply to say we don't know what the coal bonus
10 payments are going to be. Those are bid periodically and
11 we'll be trying to research and get a handle on those.
12 But the nature of those payments are not
13 suitable necessarily for long-term debt simply because it
14 is hard to predict their stability and reliability. A
15 4-mill levy statewide would generate about $31 million.
16 One of the policy issues is for you to consider that if
17 we're not going to allow for local bond issues, local
18 enhancement financing, then what will happen is that the
19 school district mills will begin to fall off the tax roll
20 and that will create capacity in some counties, not all
21 but in some counties so that becomes a policy evaluation
22 to be made.
23 And of course you all are much more familiar
24 than I with the policy implications on the 4-mill levy on
25 the mineral industry in the state and the difficulty that
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1 that creates there.
2 Half-cent sales and use tax would generate about
3 $32 million. There again, a stable and reliable source.
4 Impacts the northern part of the state where you're
5 bumping up against states with no sales tax and there's
6 concerns there about diverting sales across the border,
7 but it would generate an equivalent amount of money.
8 The 5-cent gas and diesel tax, this is based on
9 the current formula where a portion of it goes to the
10 local and a portion goes to the State. Actually it would
11 be $50 million if all of it went to the State, and of
12 course in that scenario what would happen is that the gas
13 and diesel funds would go to transportation and a portion
14 of what they're receiving now out of the $70-some million
15 from royalties would be diverted to education, which is
16 the mechanics behind that, although I understand from
17 Mr. Dobler today at lunch they're looking at their own
18 augmentation of the gas tax solely for transportation. So
19 there's policy trade-offs to be made there.
20 The point of this is not to recommend one of
21 these. It is simply to tell you the magnitude of what
22 you're looking at in order to sort of make whole the need
23 to finance this decision. And I understand that these are
24 never popular decisions or choices.
25 Some of the issues that have already been talked
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1 about but let me just add some comments to them, first of
2 all is getting a good handle on how much has already been
3 funded. If you go back and look at this list, it is not
4 easy to do. It doesn't necessarily say fix the fence at
5 George Washington High School. It says fix the electrical
6 system in these buildings.
7 So I think there's going to be some digging that
8 has to be done to identify what has already been funded.
9 The ability to expend funds in accordance with the Court
10 mandate, I think if you have read the brief that the
11 Attorney General filed to rehear the case, there's a lot
12 of concern about whether or not in Wyoming you have the
13 architectural and engineering capacity to spend $708
14 million over six years on school construction, even if you
15 bring in people from outside and if you do, what is the
16 inflation impact on that, are you going to be having to
17 pay a premium in order to meet that kind of a schedule?
18 Availability of local construction firms:
19 You've talked about who will control the allocation of
20 funds and construction processes goes to the question of
21 governance. I would certainly suggest that you are going
22 to be controlling the money, and I think all of the
23 discussion that you had today about having some review of
24 the cost estimates and what is being spent and how it is
25 being spent because we're taking away the local match,
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1 taking away the local tax requirement, there's really no
2 incentive at the local level any longer for building
3 efficiency. And I think it is incumbent as you craft a
4 strategy to build that into the strategy that you
5 recommend.
6 How will project costs be controlled, of course,
7 goes right along with that and whether you want to have
8 project management oversight that reports to the state
9 agency who is responsible for signing off on things like
10 cost overruns, I think that's an excellent idea. I work a
11 lot with big transportation projects across the country
12 and I think that's been applied efficiently and
13 effectively in cases there.
14 The question we really don't know, is the Court
15 going to modify the ruling. Are they going to change the
16 rules that these set of assumptions are based on. We
17 certainly hope that they will and give you the flexibility
18 to make policy in perhaps a less straitjacketed way.
19 These are some of the ideas that we have, some
20 of the research we've done to date. We continue to look
21 into this issue and will be making recommendations back to
22 you for your consideration. I appreciated the opportunity
23 to hear the discussion earlier today and learned quite a
24 bit about where things have been and welcome any advice
25 and guidance that the committee would have for us as we
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1 undertake this project.
2 Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
3 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Committee, any
4 questions?
5 COCHAIR DEVIN: May I ask who -- and it
6 may not be to you, Mr. Curry, it may be someone else. Has
7 anyone at this point tried to determine how much has been
8 funded in this process?
9 MR. KEITH CURRY: We've asked the
10 Department of Education and --
11 COCHAIR DEVIN: They're controlling that?
12 MR. KEITH CURRY: Yes.
13 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman --
14 I'm sorry, Madam Cochair. Were you done?
15 COCHAIR DEVIN: Yes.
16 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Curry, page
17 2, where did the -- those numbers came from the exhibits
18 referenced what?
19 MR. KEITH CURRY: Mr. Chairman, those
20 exhibits reference the MGT report and this was taken
21 verbatim out of an updated report prepared by the State
22 Department of Education.
23 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Curry, those
24 one-year figures, are those figures on page 6 one-year
25 revenue projections?
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1 MR. KEITH CURRY: Mr. Chairman, that's
2 true. Those would be as of this year. We simply took the
3 current revenues and either multiplied them or divided
4 them to get the multiplier here.
5 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Thank you.
6 That's all the questions I have.
7 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Massie.
8 SENATOR MASSIE: Mr. Chairman, one
9 question for Mr. Curry. Something else that we take out
10 of the capital construction accounts are major maintenance
11 payments to the districts, and I think that that with the
12 new formula is going to be somewhere between 25 and 30
13 million dollars a year.
14 Did you figure that into your calculations?
15 MR. KEITH CURRY: Mr. Chairman, no, that's
16 a very excellent point. In fiscal year '01 -- in fiscal
17 year '01 it was 19 and a half million and fiscal year '02
18 it was 37.8 million. That would need to be added onto the
19 numbers that we've shown you here.
20 So that gives you a sense as to the magnitude of
21 the impact of this decision on everything going on in
22 school maintenance and construction in the state.
23 SENATOR MASSIE: Just one follow-up,
24 Mr. Chairman, to that. I don't think the Supreme Court in
25 its decision differentiated between capital construction
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1 costs and major maintenance costs, so I think the $600 and
2 some million probably includes both. It is just probably
3 going to hit a little differently than what is profiled on
4 page 2. There's going to be more up-front expenditures
5 than something that is going to occur over time.
6 MR. KEITH CURRY: Mr. Chairman, that's
7 very likely to occur. This is simply a hypothetical cash
8 flow. And frankly, one of the difficulties in reading the
9 decisions is getting good definitions of precisely -- for
10 example, is success measured when we have spent the
11 present value of $563 million irrespective of what we
12 bought, or is it measured when we address all of the
13 issues we put in the decision, irrespective of how much
14 was spent to meet them? And I think the Court was silent
15 on that and it creates a lot of ambiguity for the state
16 policy implementers.
17 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Anderson, you
18 have a question?
19 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you, Mr. Chair.
20 Many times in government I feel like it is like the blind
21 men and the elephant, each committee, each part of
22 government kind of looks at a piece.
23 And as I look here and try to identify the
24 elephant, I see in terms of the whole educational piece
25 construction costs, maintenance costs, major maintenance
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1 as Senator Massie brought up, and instructional costs.
2 You take all the pieces and add them up, realizing that
3 the state is -- that the resources of the state are
4 finite, it seems to me there's going to come a time when
5 construction costs, maintenance costs and instructional
6 costs are going to start competing with one another. It
7 becomes very, very alarming to me when I look at this
8 whole picture.
9 Do you have any thoughts as a financial advisor
10 as to where you find your client in regard to all of the
11 needs in terms of all of the resources in order to deliver
12 the total package, or to look at the whole elephant? Do
13 you have any thoughts on that as you work through your
14 portion of this?
15 MR. KEITH CURRY: Mr. Chairman, we have
16 been asked by the treasurer's office to look at the other
17 functions of state government -- university system,
18 transportation, capital improvements for the state -- for
19 the state as a whole and other innovations we might be
20 able to recommend to the State in looking at your entire
21 capital needs.
22 Your point, I think, Senator, is absolutely
23 correct. These capital needs are going to come in
24 conflict with the operational needs and you see that now
25 with education. You can conceivably see that in some
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1 other areas of state government as we come forward.
2 It brings to bear, I think, a discussion on
3 revenues and whether revenues are sufficient to provide
4 the level of government needed and the level of services
5 needed in the state at the current levels. And that's a
6 difficult question and one that nobody likes to address,
7 but we're going to try to look at it and bring some
8 recommendations to you. We're going to try and see if we
9 can use and leverage the value of your current assets to
10 gain more value for you and make some recommendations in
11 those regards without new taxes.
12 But, sir, my observation initially is that
13 you've got a lot of needs in this state and that having
14 this $700 million school mandate drop on top of the state
15 is at a time particularly when you may have revenues
16 peaking because of the cyclical nature of the revenues
17 here due to the mineral extraction value that are
18 beginning to come down, I think you're at a critical
19 juncture and I think through today and how you address
20 these issues is going to make a long-term impact on the
21 quality of services in the state going forward.
22 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you,
23 Mr. Chairman. Thank you for answering a question that
24 might be more appropriately asked in the JAC.
25 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Thank you, Mr. Curry.
164
1 MR. KEITH CURRY: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
2 COCHAIR SHIVLER: That was very
3 informative and a little bit alarming.
4 You have information for us?
5 MR. NELSON: We have for you the review by
6 MGT on the projects, the written comments by the advisory
7 group.
8 (Discussion held.)
9 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Mr. Chairman, I
10 want to ask somebody about this Powell project. I mean,
11 this grant application just came in. What's the timeline
12 and what's going on here?
13 MR. NELSON: Mr. Chairman, this
14 application came through the regular process that was
15 still in effect. It came through the last -- about a year
16 ago the state superintendent issued a needs list, those
17 buildings that are in need of attention. This includes
18 one of those identified needs and it is going through the
19 regular capital construction process in review right now,
20 and it is the last cycle that will take you through
21 July 1, 2002 is when the Court has put kind of a cutoff
22 date.
23 So this would be the project that came in under
24 the regular process based upon last September's needs
25 assessment, or immediate needs list, as we call it. And
165
1 so it is going to go through that process. Based upon
2 that identification, they have submitted application to
3 the state superintendent for state assistance to go ahead
4 and commence a project that would address those identified
5 needs.
6 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: And is this
7 district permitted under the old process to be a
8 participant financially?
9 MR. NELSON: Yes, they would have to issue
10 a bond. It would be under the rules that we have in
11 existence right now.
12 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Okay.
13 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chair.
14 COCHAIR DEVIN: Well, I just want to put
15 that a little bit in caveat because frankly, in some of
16 the other education meetings it was asked exactly how will
17 this go forward and I think it is a little questionable.
18 If this bond issue has not already been passed -- if your
19 bond issue has already been passed, that may be one issue.
20 If it has not already been passed, then I am not entirely
21 sure.
22 This is an application under that process, but I
23 wouldn't want anybody to write in stone or when they're
24 writing the check be absolutely sure of how that would
25 happen. I couldn't answer that at this point. Perhaps
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1 someone else has better answers.
2 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mary Kay Hill.
3 MS. HILL: Mr. Chairman, our advice from
4 the Attorney General is that until there is a new law in
5 effect, the old law pertains. So this project from Powell
6 came in under your existing laws. It has been identified
7 as an immediate need facility and within that context we
8 are obligated to address that immediate need.
9 Now, you as a legislature have absolute
10 discretion as to how to address that immediate need, but
11 that process is one that we are obligated to follow.
12 So the application came in July 1. You will
13 also be receiving, just by way of information, a new
14 immediate needs list October 1st, and that the law still
15 requires that we identify those buildings and that then we
16 identify you -- or we advise you on the progress that is
17 being made in those communities to address those immediate
18 needs and we are still obligated to try to assure progress
19 with all immediate needs buildings.
20 The Powell recommendation will -- and I don't
21 want to predict exactly what the superintendent will do,
22 but there will be a line item request in the
23 superintendent's budget for the Powell immediate need
24 facility.
25 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Does that answer your
167
1 question on that? Well, we had -- two of us here are on
2 the committee, Senator Cathcart and myself, and we had the
3 meeting a week ago Thursday in Casper. And I think most
4 of you are aware -- or possibly you're not -- the current
5 student load in that building is 575 students. They have
6 applied for $46 and a half million, which is considerable
7 considering the number of students they have.
8 They have also applied for a 202,000-square-foot
9 building which is way outside the parameters of what it
10 would be if we went by the current facility guidelines
11 that the Department of Education has put out. That, in
12 fact, would be more in line with, I think, 114,000 square
13 feet.
14 So -- and that is at the maximum. That's using
15 180 square feet per student, and using 636 students, which
16 in fact is not the current population, that's adding 10
17 percent to the current population which is 575.
18 So what we've run into here is the size of the
19 building they're asking for is predicated on the fact
20 that's the size of the building they currently have and so
21 essentially what they're asking the State to do is replace
22 the building that they have.
23 That was built -- I think the building age is
24 between 30 and 50 years old. The scores run from 45 up to
25 57. The high school, there's also a natatorium there, a
168
1 swimming facility. And just to look at the figures on
2 top, we're basically talking about 351 square feet per
3 student. That's at the current population. The state
4 standard right now is 180 to 160; 160 being minimum, 180
5 maximum. We're looking at the design cost at $46 million,
6 575 students is $80,000 per student. The national average
7 right now is 18 to 22,000. I have this from the CFS
8 outfit -- I forget the rest of the initials, but from a
9 group that puts out the cost of construction on new
10 schools.
11 So that's considerably out of line. We just
12 built a school in Jackson which we thought was pretty
13 outrageous, $161 a square foot, came to $40,000 per
14 student, this is almost -- well, this is twice that. And
15 the cost on this building was 230 a square foot.
16 There are a lot of reasons for that. You know,
17 when we first got there we were saying, "That's a little
18 pricey. What's going on here?" There's a new natatorium
19 included, which is a swimming facility, and I think it has
20 seating for like 6 or 800. There's a new competition gym
21 that has seating for 1700. There's a new football stadium
22 that has seating for 2500 and they're also moving -- the
23 proposal is to move the building to a new site.
24 One of the suggestions or one of the appraisals
25 that the State asked for is what would it cost to remodel
169
1 the facilities to bring them up to standards. And that's
2 where we really got into figures we thought were out of
3 line, $33 million, $161 a square foot to remodel these
4 facilities.
5 Well, that costs as much as a brand-new building
6 to build in the Teton County area, which again we
7 considered excessive cost. That was a very complex
8 building because it was built on the Teton fault and had
9 to have some fairly extreme earthquake design efficiencies
10 put into it.
11 When we got into this discussion I think most of
12 us were very concerned about this and should be, at
13 $80,000 a student, I mean, that's basically what four
14 schools should cost. We could basically build four
15 schools for what they were asking for in this proposal.
16 Again, I go back and say part of that cost is
17 based on the fact that they're asking us to replace what
18 they currently have for 202,000 square feet, and this is
19 where we stand.
20 Now, the committee got together and I think we
21 decided on cutting that back to going to the student --
22 projected student load of 636, 180 square feet per
23 student, and that came to 114,000 square feet that we're
24 proposing they build. We used $161 per square feet cost
25 that was just currently completed in Jackson.
170
1 We added a practice gym, 7500 square feet, and
2 we added an auditorium. The auditorium had a $1.7 million
3 stage setup in it which we thought was a little excessive.
4 That was audio, lights, curtains, who knows, but that's
5 quite a bit of money --
6 SENATOR CATHCART: They referred to it as
7 a full performing arts stage.
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: A full performing arts
9 stage.
10 So there were a lot of things in there we
11 thought were very excessive and they were. We came back
12 at $161 per square feet, 129,000, and we proposed that
13 they cut this back to 28 million. That was the group's
14 consensus. This was the group's consensus. I didn't know
15 you were going to put these out for people to read. I
16 wouldn't have written the parable in the back.
17 At any rate, my own appraisal was we were still
18 too high with this and that, in fact, you know, we should
19 have been somewhere in the area of 120 to 140 per square
20 feet, and that's my appraisal.
21 Now, Senator Cathcart I'm sure has a position he
22 would like to make on this.
23 SENATOR CATHCART: Well, Mr. Chairman, you
24 have pretty accurately laid out what happened and what was
25 requested and what the advisory group then recommended.
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1 I, too, thought even though the request was cut
2 not quite in half but not nearly in half, I thought we
3 were still high. We allowed the 10 percent increase in
4 student enrollment based on today's enrollment, but the
5 fact is the 2004 data indicated that they were in
6 declining enrollment and the indication is the ADM in 2004
7 would be 515 students. But even considering that, we
8 allowed the 10 percent increase in ADM for the project.
9 We used the very top of the standard which was
10 180 square feet. I guess you have a range for a reason,
11 but when you go to the top and you're still, it seems, a
12 bit high -- to me $161 a square foot is pretty high. Just
13 because it costs that in Jackson doesn't mean that that's
14 the standard or that's the amount that we should approve.
15 If you look in the construction data, 2001
16 series, and you look in here, the average cost per student
17 in here is $17,200 -- not average. The average is 11,500
18 but at the three-quarter or 70th percentile of all school
19 projects built is $17,200. Now, this document does not
20 include design, engineering and site acquisition. This is
21 all construction.
22 So you can take $112 a square foot and add money
23 in there for site acquisition and design engineering.
24 Design engineering can be 5 to 10 percent of the project,
25 so that could be added on here.
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1 But even with that, we should be building
2 schools in Wyoming around $120 a square foot, in my
3 opinion, and the advisory group recommendation was for
4 $161 a square foot.
5 As we looked at the renovation -- I still have
6 all of our stuff from that meeting. To renovate 202,000
7 square feet, the bill for that was $33.4 million. That
8 comes to $165.50 per square foot for renovation, so
9 immediately that option was off the table, but that's not
10 a realistic number.
11 I think -- and Mike Baker may help with this,
12 but as we authorized the renovation at the state
13 hospital -- and trust me, we took some old buildings down
14 there and brought them back to -- they didn't cut any
15 corners. Those are nice buildings. They've been
16 renovated. And I think the cost was $67 a square foot.
17 So when you look at proposals like this for $165 a square
18 foot for renovation, that immediately takes the renovation
19 concept out of discussion.
20 So I don't think we had a fair shot at
21 discussing what portions of the buildings could be
22 renovated, maybe not all but maybe some of it could.
23 So I agree with Representative Shivler and his
24 comments.
25 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Well, I think this is
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1 where we get back to what we were talking about earlier,
2 enhancements. If we're going to build a new swimming
3 pool, natatorium, in Powell simply because they have one
4 now, are we going to be obligated in the future to build
5 47 more?
6 And based on the -- I read the very paragraph to
7 the committee in Casper that Ray read to us earlier from
8 the Supreme Court ruling, that this could be deemed to
9 become state standard if we do this. It doesn't say it
10 will be, but it could be, and I don't think we can take
11 that chance.
12 You know, this is just kind of a sidelight, but
13 if you interpolate this out at $80,000 a student, that's
14 $7.6 billion we would have to spend for 85,000 students if
15 we got into this thing we're going to equalize everything.
16 I think earlier when I asked Mr. Hunkins if we, in fact,
17 build a school for 350 a square foot could that be
18 interpreted as that every school has the right to have a
19 $350-square-foot school.
20 I think this is something we need to be very
21 careful about. We sent this back to them. Their position
22 was it can't be done. That's what I recall.
23 SENATOR CATHCART: Mr. Chairman, I think
24 so.
25 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Coe.
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1 SENATOR COE: Mr. Chairman, there's the
2 representative from Powell High School and this is close
3 to my district and I know the district pretty well. The
4 high school, I believe, was built in about '63 or '64. Is
5 that about right?
6 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: '48 and '49.
7 SENATOR COE: '48? The old high school
8 was tore down in '52 -- that's probably about right. It
9 doesn't have the earthquake problems we had with the high
10 school in Cody. I don't know if they're talking about
11 replacing the old gym completely.
12 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: The old one, yes.
13 SENATOR COE: The old one, yes.
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: In Powell this is a
15 completely new campus. Another location down the street.
16 SENATOR COE: I don't understand the
17 football stadium, moving that. I think there's a way to
18 go in and look at renovation in there. You know, do we
19 have the means to put -- to send somebody up there and
20 say, "Let's have our look at it. You come to us with your
21 presentation. Now we want to go have a look at it"?
22 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Coe, this was
23 one of the recommendations we had at this committee
24 meeting and something that has apparently never been done.
25 And Senator Cathcart and I certainly supported it.
175
1 One of the gentlemen from the university
2 suggested it is awful hard to make a decision on a
3 building based on the fact we had never seen it. Before
4 we get into looking at these kinds of things, it might be
5 necessary to have a one-day walk-through -- this is what
6 we have now, this is what we can do -- because we were
7 essentially in the dark and we had some pictures, but, you
8 know, the pictures are apparently what they want you to
9 see.
10 SENATOR COE: It is frustrating to me and
11 over the years and what we spent, we adopted and paid for
12 the differences. I hate to say it like that, but that's
13 exactly what you're talking about.
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Well, it is true. I
15 think one of the things we're going to run into -- and the
16 gentleman from Lander just mentioned this to me a few
17 minutes ago, you know, I think some of us feel some of
18 their requests are excessive and perhaps we need to cut
19 them back. But, in fact, they have already done their
20 bonding and their bonding was based on the fact that we're
21 going to get $20 million from the State, and so, you know,
22 let's belly up and vote for the bond. In fact, the people
23 did.
24 If you cut it back at this point, those folks
25 are going to be awful upset. They will feel like they
176
1 were lied to. I think that's a realistic -- that's a
2 problem. That's a problem we have right now. We don't
3 have that problem in Powell because I don't think they put
4 the bond issue out.
5 SENATOR COE: They haven't done that, but
6 the Powell paper, just in the paper their enrollment was
7 down 78 or 79 students in the district. We do have
8 declining enrollment as compared to last year.
9 COCHAIR SHIVLER: When this school was
10 completed, that's one of the things Rich and I worked out
11 at the meeting. When this school is completed they'll
12 only have 515 students. At that point the cost will be
13 90,000 a student instead of 80 and we will have built 400
14 square feet per student. At the point of when it is
15 occupied with 515 students, they will be sitting in a
16 facility with 400 square feet per student which is more
17 than twice the maximum.
18 SENATOR CATHCART: Mr. Chairman, I just
19 want to add also, when you get out a document like this
20 and some people question whether or not it is valid, I've
21 made my living in the construction business and I have bid
22 hundreds of jobs by using the data in R.S. Means, the
23 current data, and I learned that if I bid a job exactly by
24 the numbers that Means tells me to bid it and what it
25 should cost, I always get beat.
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1 You go to the back of the book, then you've got
2 regional cost adjustments for Wyoming, so what should it
3 cost in Wyoming compared to what the data tells you. The
4 regional cost adjustment for Wyoming is 96 percent of what
5 the data tells you. I've made a living bidding jobs by
6 using this data and I know that construction projects know
7 this is a reliable source of what it should cost.
8 And whether or not districts come in -- and I
9 think their argument was the fact that we're out of
10 building contractors in Wyoming now and we're going to
11 have to bring people in from out of state to bid these and
12 it will be expensive.
13 I attended a meeting of the Wyoming Contractors
14 Association and, believe me, they're foaming at the mouth
15 with the anticipation of 2 or 3 or $400 million worth of
16 school buildings. Contractors respond to the demand.
17 Right now they're out building highway bridges and other
18 things. But when we start putting schoolhouses on the --
19 up for bid and multi-million-dollar projects, the
20 contractors will respond to that.
21 And they are, in fact, gearing up and I can name
22 any number of them, local, in-state general contractors
23 that haven't built a school in five or six years, but
24 they're very capable and they will be back in the school-
25 building business as soon as there are jobs to bid. And I
178
1 think they're gearing up for that. I'm not the least bit
2 concerned.
3 The last school I built was Alta Vista. There
4 was five in-state generals that bid that. Successful
5 bidder came all the way down here from Cody. But there's
6 never been a lack of bidders to bid on hard money projects
7 and schoolhouses or anything else.
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Baker -- excuse
9 me -- Representative Baker. I didn't mean to slight you.
10 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Thank you,
11 Mr. Chairman. Which brings back up the point when I look
12 at suggested issues for select capital construction, I
13 thought there may need to be an additional step in that,
14 and that's before or somewhere in the needs for
15 determination there needs to be an identification and a
16 process where clear options are laid before a committee or
17 a group of responsible people as far as -- and I don't
18 mean to say somebody else is irresponsible, but of
19 responsible people to identify more clearly the options
20 that should be available to a decision-making body.
21 The process and the reason I say that clearly
22 is, just as the chairman has said, at this point there are
23 expectations in a community about a certain result that
24 pushes a political process towards an end and should
25 that -- where should that decision have been made that a
179
1 complete new building was needed or that the other options
2 were adequately looked at.
3 Right now all the options are left locally until
4 the point where it comes to yes or no. Well, it is a
5 little bit late then to say halfway or maybe or if or what
6 about? And so we -- as far as the elements of the
7 process, we need to add another step in here that more
8 clearly delineates all of the options to some
9 policy-making body that can clearly look at it.
10 And I agree, I have seen the same thing in every
11 construction project that's before the legislature now.
12 Every one of them has said, well, we can't renovate, with
13 the exception of one very small project, can't renovate,
14 and that one very small project is in its own way pushed
15 by the dollars because it is able to retain more square
16 footage than if it tore that down.
17 And so they're trying to retain square footage
18 for what? Maybe a bigger section of major maintenance. I
19 mean, you know, we have to look at and have another step
20 in this process, something between needs determination and
21 planning or something in here to develop all of the
22 options completely. And I agree with the two members of
23 the School Capital Construction Advisory Group, those
24 options have not been developed.
25 The want or the need is -- all the data is
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1 pushed towards, okay, what does this school board or that
2 group want. And suddenly -- I mean, here's the pinnacle,
3 here's what we want and everything else is all poo-poo'd,
4 not given its fair shake.
5 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Representative Anderson.
6 SENATOR ANDERSON: Just a point of
7 clarification. Where does equipment and furniture --
8 COCHAIR SHIVLER: It is in there. The
9 $161 a square foot -- at the meeting I wasn't as prepared
10 as I should have been. I had gotten the information from
11 the architect from Powell, did that include furniture and
12 equipment, and I wasn't sure. That's why we added a
13 couple things in there. When I went back and asked, the
14 161 was everything, advertising -- that was what it cost
15 for the district.
16 Bruce Hayes was moderator at the DOE and he did
17 a fine job.
18 Are we portraying this accurately and is there
19 anything you would like to add to it?
20 MR. HAYES: No, Mr. Chairman. No, that
21 basically was the essence of it.
22 REPRESENTATIVE MORGAN: Was it determined
23 that in the existing school -- was it needing to be torn
24 down? Do we need to build a new school?
25 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Well, based on what they
181
1 gave us, these were the scores. The scores were on the --
2 the high school building itself was 45.9 which, you know,
3 I think could be brought up. And the natatorium was 41
4 and the gymnasium was 47. They gave us those figures.
5 Based on the information they gave us on a
6 remodel at $160 a foot, their position was, gosh, we can
7 build new for 46, so we don't want to get involved in
8 remodeling. That goes back to what Representative Baker
9 was saying.
10 Was that really a concerted effort to see if we
11 could really remodel this? I think $50, $60 a foot would
12 have done a fine job of that.
13 COCHAIR DEVIN: Mr. Chairman, I guess
14 we're back at the point when you just look at those scores
15 of what we learned this morning, by just looking at the
16 score you don't know what the composition that caused that
17 score to be at that level was, what the components were.
18 And so if you're going to back-engineer, for
19 lack of a better term, the reason that you have a 45 and a
20 41 and a 57, you need to dig into what components of that
21 were and what it would cost to repair them, you know, and
22 probably that's where you would find that.
23 You know, if you looked at those kinds of
24 things, it is not the price that you're getting. But that
25 part needs a part of our determination process in that we
182
1 have to go beyond the pure score to look at how it was
2 weighted, what the weighting of those components were.
3 COCHAIR SHIVLER: You spend $3 million and
4 bring it to 70 is the question.
5 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: Mr. Chairman, the
6 entire school district, which is Park County Number One,
7 by MGT's recommendation the entire school district could
8 be brought up to standard for $15.2 million.
9 Now, is that interesting or what? According to
10 needed repairs and modifications by category, the
11 renovation of the entire school district is $15.2 million.
12 COCHAIR SHIVLER: That includes other
13 schools other than high school?
14 REPRESENTATIVE BAKER: That's the whole
15 district.
16 COCHAIR DEVIN: You may have to apply an
17 inflation figure, but still --
18 SENATOR COE: Mr. Chairman, I know the
19 structural integrity on the high school. They do not have
20 the earthquake problem a lot of our schools have up there.
21 I know that.
22 SENATOR ANDERSON: Mr. Chairman.
23 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Anderson.
24 SENATOR ANDERSON: Thank you,
25 Mr. Chairman. Without having been on site, it seems to me
183
1 if you have a building capable of being renovated and
2 remodeled in a district that has a declining enrollment,
3 the argument towards remodeling would be more positive
4 than in a district where you have expanding enrollment and
5 the need for additional capacity. Where you have
6 declining enrollment, I think the remodeling concept
7 becomes more attractive.
8 SENATOR MASSIE: I want to emphasize what
9 Senator Devin pointed out because I think that's going to
10 be a critical step for us to take when we draft
11 legislation and go to the next step. I know how some
12 people feel about the Supreme Court decision, but in
13 reality what the Supreme Court was doing was taking the
14 present system and evaluating how consistent we were in
15 implementing that system.
16 And I think that the present system is based
17 totally on scores and getting people up to a certain
18 score. As we talked about this morning, though, I think
19 we've identified other factors, as Senator Devin pointed
20 out. We indeed do have an interest in raising the scores
21 of these buildings based on the present system for
22 financial and economic reasons. In the long term it may
23 cost us less to do it right now, but there's that other
24 factor, how does it affect the ability of that school
25 district to provide that educational basket of goods and
184
1 services, you know, to the students?
2 And I think that's something that's been missing
3 in this entire discussion with regard to the Powell school
4 district because we haven't identified that yet. We may
5 have school buildings with low scores, but the instruction
6 has not been compromised, the scores have not been
7 compromised, the essence of what the Supreme Court says is
8 our constitutional responsibility has not been
9 compromised. We have to figure out a way to evaluate that
10 using the scores in coming up with another set of
11 criteria.
12 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Dodds.
13 MR. CROMWELL: Mr. Chairman, can I
14 emphasize a couple points that I keep coming across? And
15 I did a review of this project for how it aligned with the
16 state guidelines and there's a couple issues that keep
17 coming up all of the time, and I think they'll keep coming
18 up until they're dealt with.
19 And if I can touch on them real quickly, one of
20 them is the guidelines of 180 gross square feet maximum
21 per student is that guideline states that gym space that
22 exceeds the typical space of the guideline examples is not
23 included in that 180 square feet. If you're going to have
24 a competition gym and you want a practice gym, that
25 practice gym is not in that 180 gross square feet. But
185
1 the guidelines don't say whether or not you can have a
2 practice gym or not. It doesn't speak to that.
3 The guidelines also say that the competition
4 gym, the amount of seating will vary from school to school
5 but doesn't set any kind of parameters. So the size of
6 that gym can be a lot of different things even though it
7 is a competition gym. It is frustrating for the design
8 professionals in the school districts to know exactly what
9 is allowed under that 180 gross square feet.
10 Another thing that I found consistently was
11 that -- and you touched on this -- is that the guidelines
12 say you can only pay on a school 10 percent more than last
13 year's enrollment. It doesn't speak to the fact that's a
14 maximum. It doesn't speak to the fact you should probably
15 be doing enrollment projections that are soundly based as
16 professionally as you can. And then what do you do in the
17 case if your projections show enrollment decline? I think
18 there should be some guidance given in those areas.
19 And then I think a third major thing that was a
20 concern, this project was for -- the capacity of the
21 school was 6 --
22 COCHAIR SHIVLER: 637.
23 MR. CROMWELL: -- 637 students. But when
24 you calculate the capacity of the design by the capacity
25 calculations that the Department of Education has
186
1 recommended which are -- which is a formula that has been
2 recommended by the Council of Educational Facility
3 Planners, the capacity of that design was over a thousand
4 students.
5 So there's another problem of how are we
6 calculating the capacity of school designs and how many
7 students are we really designing for.
8 I think these kinds of issues, if they can be
9 clarified, will really help this whole process come along
10 a lot smoother. People's expectations will be clearer and
11 how to judge what is an acceptable design would be
12 clearer.
13 COCHAIR SHIVLER: No, I agree. I think
14 one of the issues here is these folks were looking at
15 replacing what they had. They said we've had 202,000
16 square feet since 1950 and that's what we would like to
17 do. They do a good job on their education, top of the
18 list on WYCAS and graduation of students.
19 But by the same token, I think we're in
20 agreement we can't afford to do this. It has to be based
21 on current student load, not 20 or 15 years ago. I agree
22 100 percent we need to have a factor in there for
23 declining schools because in our state there's only three
24 districts that gained enrollment last year and that's
25 something I don't think a lot of us realize.
187
1 SENATOR CATHCART: When I said we should
2 build in Wyoming for 120 or $130 a square foot, the 161
3 that is plugged in here is all-inclusive. That includes
4 design engineering, site, furnishings, the whole works
5 when this is done. So 161 may not be too far off of where
6 we should be, but it still seems high to me.
7 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Representative Simpson.
8 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, I'm
9 not clear whether there's a component of the plan to allow
10 for expansion of the school if a new one is constructed,
11 and we need to make sure one is in there and the initial
12 construction is done in a way that expansion can be done
13 at the cheapest cost possible with the pod system or
14 whatever you use. That has to be in there, especially in
15 view of fluctuating enrollments because we hope to grow
16 and Powell hopes to grow.
17 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I agree.
18 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: And we need to be
19 ready for that.
20 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Every county in Wyoming
21 will tell you they're growing when in fact they're not.
22 But no, I agree. And that's always, I think, the -- I
23 think all good architects plan for expansion on schools
24 and any other type of public facility.
25 Am I correct on that?
188
1 MR. CROMWELL: I would hope so.
2 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Anyone else?
3 SENATOR ANDERSON: I guess quickly part of
4 my sensitivity to this population issue comes from having
5 come from a district that grossly overbuilt and they
6 grossly overbuilt as a result of what they thought was
7 complete and accurate and reliable information. But given
8 the swings and whatnot we have in the state, we find out
9 that's not always the case.
10 But I was also intrigued with the fact that
11 there was one proposal where I read that they wanted to go
12 out and recapture the dropout population and that was part
13 of the rationale for their increase in capacity.
14 So I guess I just want to emphasize that there
15 is really an area, and I think reiterating what he said,
16 we really need to pay attention to this because it is a
17 costly area. I know from my experience, this district,
18 these buildings have set vacant for eight, ten years, the
19 heat, the whole thing. I think this is an issue that we
20 really need to pay careful attention to.
21 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Madam Chair.
22 COCHAIR DEVIN: I just wanted to comment.
23 We get in one pattern of thought and stay there and we
24 have typically done -- some of you in the field help me --
25 but what we call stick construction or brick and mortar
189
1 construction in this state. I was just down visiting my
2 children mid-August and a new school is going in in their
3 neighborhood where we walk. It will open this next
4 session. There was nothing on the site. This was
5 Arizona. It is bare. That school will come in, be up and
6 functioning. It comes in prebuilt. It will be put
7 together. They are starting school there this September
8 for 300 kids.
9 That's a concept we've never used nor thought
10 about. But, I mean, there's all kinds of approaches to
11 maybe better to think that way for sudden unexpected
12 expansion than to think we have to build fixed structures
13 for it over a long period of time and then not have it
14 happen.
15 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mr. Hayes is putting
16 together some information for us right now. It was
17 supposed to be here today. They just built a school
18 similar to that in Utah and what I had asked him to do was
19 give us the square foot cost, design, that type of thing.
20 Is it GE Capital Construction?
21 MR. HAYES: Mr. Chairman, that's correct,
22 GE Capital Space.
23 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Go ahead, I'm sorry,
24 Bruce.
25 MR. HAYES: Their experience -- we call
190
1 this a hybrid system. Basically what we're looking at is
2 a site-built school, brick exterior, metal roof,
3 everything you would expect in a site building. The guts
4 of the building are prefabricated sections and you would
5 never really know that by taking a picture unless you knew
6 it was built that way. They historically come 5, 10, 15
7 percent under a site building. They're done in most other
8 states around outside of Wyoming.
9 COCHAIR SHIVLER: They guarantee a 50-year
10 life?
11 MR. HAYES: That's correct, designed for
12 50 years.
13 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, I
14 think the issues that Mr. Cromwell brought up are pretty
15 critical to resolve as quickly as possible. Will the
16 Department of Education be doing that or do we need to
17 talk about that?
18 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think that's why this
19 committee was formed. I think we're supposed to give some
20 kind of guidance to the legislature on what direction are
21 we going. And I think that one of the things we need to
22 have when we're done is a format whereby a school -- you
23 know, what they expect when they design the school, they
24 have a program, parameters and hopefully they have a
25 budget or area of a budget.
191
1 And the information we've had today I think is
2 helping us in that direction.
3 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman,
4 aren't we talking about design criteria though that maybe
5 need to be more specifically identified and are already in
6 rules and regulations of the DOE?
7 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Have you seen the new
8 facilities guidelines?
9 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: I have. That's
10 what we're talking about?
11 COCHAIR SHIVLER: We need to probably
12 expand those.
13 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: So could we have
14 some suggestions on how to address the questions he raised
15 so we can maybe make a recommendation on those, or is that
16 appropriate?
17 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think it is
18 appropriate.
19 Mr. Hayes.
20 MR. HAYES: Mr. Chairman, I would welcome
21 any feedback from you, from the group.
22 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I think possibly it
23 would be a good idea. And I've read them, I've gone
24 through them, and there are several questions in there. A
25 good example is the -- I think the way the auditorium is
192
1 set up now you can build an auditorium that seats
2 one-third in population.
3 MR. HAYES: That's correct.
4 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Is that what we're going
5 to go with? I think we were talking today wouldn't it be
6 nice to seat everyone. When I went to high school in the
7 dark ages, we had an auditorium that didn't seat everyone
8 but we had a gymnasium that did. Can we afford to build
9 auditoriums that are going to be used basically twice a
10 year, for graduation and the first day of school and the
11 rest of the time be used for very small groups?
12 That is a question we have to answer. And
13 that's up to the committee. I think we can certainly make
14 some recommendations to the legislature and see what their
15 feelings are on it. But, you know, I don't have the
16 answer.
17 When I used to design auditoriums we designed
18 them for 75 percent of the student population. That was a
19 Florida standard. Now it may have changed. Now we're
20 going 33 percent in Wyoming. That's what the new
21 guidelines call for. In other words, your auditorium
22 seats 33 percent of your student population.
23 Now, the question is, is that appropriate, do we
24 want to push that forward or should we increase the size
25 of it? I mean, the two proposals we've had come in so
193
1 far, Lander and Powell, have both said that's not
2 appropriate and we need to seat at least enough people for
3 all of the families to come to graduation. That was
4 stated from both schools.
5 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Devin.
6 COCHAIR DEVIN: But there is the
7 alternative of holding graduation in the gymnasium like
8 most of us do. Isn't that still the case?
9 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I would think so, yes.
10 I would think so.
11 COCHAIR DEVIN: And I guess, then, you
12 know, to follow up, I'm wondering if we need -- if our
13 consultants, Dodds, maybe need to pose those questions
14 that you feel may not be answered or at least work with
15 Bruce on what additionally needs to be answered. When it
16 comes to policy questions, et cetera, I think this
17 committee needs to take a look at them.
18 How far we get into rulemaking and the
19 technicalities of guidelines, that gets a little, you
20 know -- I'm not sure we want to go into each and every one
21 of those, but somewhere they probably need to be spelled
22 out, which I think is what I'm hearing.
23 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, I
24 have the site selection and the rules for site selection
25 and school construction, and the one thing that concerned
194
1 me about Powell's proposal is that they're currently on 14
2 acres. Well, the minimum site requirements for a school
3 of over 400 students is 20 acres. Can we renovate it?
4 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Well, my understanding
5 is that's for new schools. I mean, that's if you build a
6 new school that's the minimum. Existing schools can be
7 renovated on a smaller site, I'm sure of that.
8 MR. HAYES: Mr. Chairman, that's correct.
9 MR. NELSON: Mr. Chairman, I might add
10 another comment, too. It is kind of like two different
11 timelines we're looking at here. We're looking at
12 projects currently in the loop here and how much you can
13 remedy whatever problems there are for those projects.
14 There is -- we're looking at from a date in the future
15 forward and a lot of that can be resolved by whatever you
16 put together.
17 Hopefully they'll relook at the guidelines, the
18 whole parameter that they utilize to assess the needs to
19 review the project, whatever structure you put forward. A
20 lot of that will have to change, and as Senator Devin
21 said, a lot of that, I think, has to be discussed. So
22 there are kind of two time frames to look at.
23 So what might be helpful to the committee is
24 have MGT maybe make suggestions on some of the problems he
25 had that pertained to things that you're going to be
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1 considering this session with projects in the pipeline, so
2 to speak, and how you can remedy that and then in the
3 future could build on that down the road through a whole
4 process.
5 Does that help any?
6 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Well, I agree with that.
7 But I think the danger is what we're building today could
8 become the standard of tomorrow and I think we've
9 discussed that today with Ray and Dennis and if that's the
10 case, we certainly don't want to go down that road.
11 MR. NELSON: Maybe that's why he could
12 give us some recommendation as far as the things you will
13 be determining how to fund this session.
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mr. Cromwell, you've
15 done two of these appraisals now, right, Powell and
16 Lander?
17 MR. CROMWELL: Yes.
18 COCHAIR SHIVLER: And perhaps you could
19 outline some of the things that you think we need to
20 clarify and some suggestions how you might do it.
21 MR. CROMWELL: I would be happy to.
22 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Senator Massie.
23 SENATOR MASSIE: Mr. Chairman, since we
24 created a law, we can also get rid of it too next session.
25 I guess one option is to simply tell Powell at the next
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1 session that we're in the process of creating a new
2 system, in fact we will probably pass it at the next
3 session based upon a recommendation to the committee and
4 Powell will go through the system at that point.
5 Maybe in defense of Powell is that the last cap
6 con and the Select Committee on school finance also took a
7 shot at school finance issue and there was an ongoing
8 debate about how much control the state should exert. And
9 there was a very strong prevailing concept that we'll
10 leave it to the local voters. If this is what they want
11 and they vote on it and they pass a bond, that's what the
12 state should be supporting. And we did provide some
13 oversight for ourselves when those districts had to come
14 to us and ask for some grants.
15 Otherwise, especially for those districts under
16 150 percent of the statewide assessed valuation, we gave
17 them money. We allowed them to even decide with local
18 voting that the State would participate in this process.
19 So our present statutes really do favor the local
20 districts and we allowed them to, for the most part, give
21 them the discretion to allow these things. And I think
22 that's what Powell was exercising.
23 We should remember we do have the option with
24 this particular project of saying, "This is too big right
25 now. We may be setting precedents." You may have a very
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1 good point, that we're going to have to honor this down
2 the line in the new system. Maybe this should be the
3 first one that goes through in this session and we don't
4 have to make a decision this session.
5 REPRESENTATIVE SIMPSON: Mr. Chairman, on
6 the minimum site requirements, we ought to look at the
7 acreage requirements here. And there's a statement in
8 here that says, "The Wyoming site requirements are shown
9 below," and then it says, "However, the latest Council of
10 Educational Facility Planners international site standards
11 shall prevail if available and published after April
12 2001."
13 We're adopting a standard and we have no idea
14 even what the standard is or whether it would apply to
15 Wyoming locally or whether it is reasonable.
16 MR. HAYES: Mr. Chairman, may I speak to
17 that?
18 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mr. Hayes.
19 MR. HAYES: When these went to print, CFPI
20 was in the middle of revising its site standards downward.
21 What they found was that they had been historically too
22 big, that they didn't have to be quite as many acres as
23 they had believed. And so that paragraph is intended to
24 address that so we don't take into account or believe
25 we've got more acres than we really need to build on.
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1 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Mary Kay.
2 MS. HILL: Mr. Chairman, if I could add to
3 Bruce's point, a couple things are important to know.
4 Representative Simpson, one, districts may seek a waiver
5 of any of the guidelines up and down depending on what
6 their local wish would be.
7 The other thing is that as of January 1, 1998,
8 any facility existing prior to that fell into the
9 governance of the guidelines at that time. So the new
10 guidelines apply to new construction, but the January 1,
11 1998 standards apply to any building that was built at
12 that time. So that may clear up some confusion about the
13 site.
14 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Any more questions?
15 Committee?
16 I think we all agree that we certainly need some
17 more clarification on how our schools are designed. We
18 certainly need to give this to our districts. Hopefully
19 we're heading in that direction. I think with the
20 information we're going to get from MGT and from our
21 esteemed leader Dave, we will have something to look at
22 the next meeting.
23 I think our stenographer asked for a five-minute
24 break after two hours. Let's take a ten-minute break and
25 come back and look at our other business and future
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1 meetings, and we should be done.
2 (Recess taken 3:22 p.m. until 3:40 p.m.)
3 COCHAIR SHIVLER: I don't know, do we have
4 any other business?
5 MR. NELSON: Vouchers.
6 (Discussion held.)
7 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Does anybody in the
8 audience have any statements to make or would you like to
9 chastise us or praise us or anything like that?
10 One in the back there.
11 MR. CUSTER: Rod Custer, Johnson County.
12 We're a pipeline school district and I want to thank you
13 for putting the hard questions out there because we've
14 been struggling with them with you for two years. And
15 hopefully the MGT review coming up in October for us
16 coming back to the JAC in October is going to answer some
17 of those questions. And I don't think there's been a
18 clear-cut answer for anybody yet. If you've got them,
19 would you come up to Johnson County and answer the
20 patrons' questions for you?
21 I would like to thank you, though, you are
22 asking the good questions. And I think Senator Massie
23 talked about program needs. I think that's a part of it.
24 And I do believe that the educators -- not all of us are
25 out there trying to build Taj Mahals. Some us are trying
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1 to do what's right for kids and meet the needs of the
2 communities. We're talking about schools for the next 90
3 years and Bruce gave me the nod for having the oldest
4 school in operation in the state still.
5 Thank you for going after what you go after. I
6 know you get ridiculed for what you're trying to do, as I
7 do in the community, for trying to solve this problem of
8 capital construction. But I think there are many
9 questions that can still be answered and I think some of
10 the educators can address some of the things like
11 auditoriums, gymnasiums.
12 And I heard Senator Cathcart talk about dollar
13 amounts because I thought we were out of line on a couple
14 and you've restated some numbers that made me feel good on
15 the numbers that we're working on. Keep working on it and
16 don't be afraid to ask some of those of us out there in
17 the middle of it for help and ideas and questions. We
18 don't have the answers and we're working it with you. We
19 don't all want a Taj Mahal. We just want a school to meet
20 our needs, meet the educational needs for the next 50
21 years. We'll argue with you and help you if we can.
22 COCHAIR SHIVLER: Thank you, Rod. I think
23 it is clear there's no magic answers, certainly not at
24 this table. We're struggling in that direction.
25 Hopefully after a few more meetings we'll have more
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1 information and a better direction.
2 And that's where we're heading and I think
3 that's the consensus that's where we want to be. The
4 implications for the state in the long run are very
5 important. We're talking about 700 million and haven't
6 talked about paying a teacher yet. We have other costs
7 and we're just focusing on capital construction. We take
8 all the state's money and build buildings, we're not going
9 to have any money to put in to teach.
10 We appreciate all of you being here and if no
11 one else has anything to say, I think our next meeting has
12 not been determined. We're kind of shooting for the end
13 of this month, third week of this month, but we'll have to
14 determine when MGT can get the information back. We'll
15 certainly let you know -- pardon, end of September. I
16 said this month. I'm sorry. End of September.
17 We're really getting close on the court
18 decision, too. If they don't give us something soon, what
19 do you do? So I appreciate everyone being here and we
20 will adjourn at this point.
21 (Committee proceedings concluded
22 3:45 p.m., August 30, 2001.)
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1 C E R T I F I C A T E
2
3 I, JANET DEW-HARRIS, a Registered Professional
4 Reporter, and Federal Certified Realtime Reporter, do
5 hereby certify that I reported by machine shorthand the
6 committee proceedings contained herein, and that the
7 foregoing 201 pages constitute a full, true and correct
8 transcript.
9 Dated this 18th day of September, 2001.
10
11
12 JANET DEW-HARRIS
Registered Professional Reporter
13 Federal Certified Realtime Reporter
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