South Royalton School
Will Have New Gym
By M. D. Drysdale

The Vermont Plywood factory in Hancock has closed its doors, leaving 35 workers jobless. The state government worked hard to open the factory after a previous closure, but the restructured company only lasted three years. (Herald / Tim Calabro)

Royalton voters turned out in large numbers Tuesday to approve construction of a new gymnasium, lobby, and improved traffic flow for the South Royalton School.

The vote in favor of a $3,880,000 bond issue for the school project was 342 to 293.

Although the vote total was only about 33% of the town’s 1900-plus registered voters, it was considered a big turnout for a single-issue vote.

Construction should be able to start later this year.

School board and building committee members said they thought a key factor was the newly competitive environment among public schools, which are attempting to woo as many students as possible from towns which don’t have their own high schools.

"A lot of people recognize that for schools to be viable, they need to be a bit competitive," said Scholl Board Chair John Olmstead Wednesday.

"Our community center is the school, and people didn’t want to lose that center. They wanted South Royalton School to be a school of choice."

"We are just very pleased, obviously," said Shaun Pickett, principal of the K-12 school. For him, the most important issue was safety, he said.

The new lobby and orientation of the school will allow for a safer pattern of traffic circulation and student drop-off, the project’s promoters said.

The favorable vote is also a favorable indication of "how we feel about our school," Pickett said.

He said that the improvements would make it easier to continue the school’s accreditation. The last accreditation team had "issues" about the facility in general, including the multi-purpose rooms, which will be addressed in this project, he said.

School Board Chair Olmstead said that the credit for the positive vote should go to the Building Committee, chaired by physical education teacher Jim Hewitt.

"They did a good job of nailing the scope of the project town to what was necessary but practical, and had some aesthetic appeal, too," he said. The committee also did an excellent job of communicating with the community, he said.

This was the third attempt in eight years to pass a bond issue that included a new gym. The first one in 1999 was for $10 million and also included an auditorium, classroom space, and general upgrading.

The second proposal was for upwards of $5 million, which also included new classroom spaces. Both these proposals failed with the voters.

Hewitt said he wasn’t quite sure why this vote succeeded after the two failures. But he said he saw the voters as "looking toward the future rather than the present.

"People expressed to me that they would rather pay now than pay later," he said. "They’re getting more bang for their buck and know the money is going toward real improvement."

He also credited the "multiple forums" held with the community for getting the information out.

"There was a lot of good energy in the school today," he said.

Geo Honigford, an organic vegetable farmer, was another member of the building committee.

"It is great news," he said Wednesday. "We knew if we had an opportunity to talk to people, we could get them to really think about it."

Voters could be shown that the project was "not just a gym," he said.

"It was about keeping our school as the center of the community." If Royalton didn’t do something now, it would be more likely to face declining enrollments in the future, he said.