CREC Deciding Between Two Sites for New Magnet School

Although the Planning and Zoning Commission has  concerns about incorporating a magnet school into the Avon Village Center master plan, the Capitol Region Education Council would prefer the proposed site in Avon Park North.

“I don’t want the school driving what happens in the town center,” commission member Linda Keith said at a special Planning and Zoning Commission meeting on Tuesday night.

In the event that the commission does not approve of building a larger facility for the Reggio Magnet School of the Arts, the education council has a commitment from the owner of  the 59 Waterville Road. property to sell as a fallback location, Donald Walsh, the council's deputy executive director, said. The site is next to the Avon Cider Mill at 57 Waterville Road.

“We’ve opened a line of communication with the owner of the second site,” Walsh said.

Overall, the commission favored the second site.

“I’ve got not problem with this site at all,” said Carol Griffin, a  commission member. She  opposed amending the current regulations to increase the student population cap from 150 students to 480. The commission approved the amendment by a 4-2 vote.

Traffic — which is also a concern of the commission for a separate proposal to build a Fresh Market in Nod Brook Mall — was a major deterrent for building a school in a potential future village center.

“A lot of traffic would be on a lot of internal roads of Avon Park North,” Duane Starr, commission chair, said.

He pointed out that locating the school on the Waterville site would allow more convenient access to the highway for commuters.

The majority of commission members said they favor the Waterville site and against the Climax Drive site. Member Christian Gackstatter said he wasn’t opposed to the other site and commission member Douglas Thompson said he’d prefer the school to be built in Avon Park North.

A 245-student Reggio school already exists at 150 Fisher Drive, sharing the building with the Farmington Valley Academy Montessori. The school’s population is growing and council executive director Bruce Douglas said at a previous Planning and Zoning meeting that the council hopes to open a larger facility by Sept. 2013.

The council is preparing site plans for both the Waterville and Avon Park North sites simultaneously.

Gackstatter posed the question of when CREC needed to decide on one site or the other.

“We’re going to need to resolve this in the early spring. We need to know where we’re going to be,” Walsh said.

CREC cannot submit a site plan unless the state has purchased the land from either the cider mill or Ensign-Bickford Realty, and the owners of the two sites are awaiting a commitment either way before they will sell.

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