Marblehead school project aims for Facebook

MARBLEHEAD – By this spring supporters of the proposed $25.45 million Glover School will be able to do more than vote.They can be the lower-cost project’s friend on Facebook.Glover-Eveleth Principal Mary Devlin told the 30 people in the Glover gym for the project’s first open forum Tuesday evening that a team has already begun looking at ways to get information on the school to the public.In addition to large open forums like the one Tuesday night, Devlin said the team is also considering small 10-15 person coffees in people’s homes.”The group is dragging me into technology,” she added. “We’re talking about a page on Facebook. We want to get the information out and people will make the choices that they make.”Last spring a $28.8 million Glover proposal passed Town Meeting but lost a bonded debt override election by 71 votes town-wide, perhaps in part because of a rumor that the 40 percent reimbursement promised to Marblehead by the Massachusetts School Building Authority wasn’t secure.This year the MSBA has again agreed to provide the town with 40 percent reimbursement, making the actual cost to Marblehead $15.25 million. “That figure (40 percent) is secure,” Glover School Building Committee Co-Chairman Pat Blackmer told the crowd.The only critic who spoke Tuesday night was Nick Freeman, who has attended numerous Glover School project meetings to advocate for building the new school on the Eveleth School site instead of the Glover site.Glover Committee Co-Chair Bob Schaeffer and committee member Dick Nohelty reminded Freeman that the Eveleth lot is smaller than the Glover lot and there are public safety concerns inherent in building a school on a lot as small as Eveleth’s.Pointing out that the committee has been advised by professionals on the construction issues, Schaeffer said, “We’ve arrived at this plan through hard work. Is there a lack of trust in that information?”Devlin, who praised Freeman for attending the meetings, reminded him that pushing a different plan now could cost the town $10 million in MSBA reimbursement.