Margaret Landsman is a 33-year resident of Concord whose three children went through the Concord public schools. She retired from NHTI as an ESOL teacher in 2020.

Concord’s school board is the last in the state to have unrestricted power to make fiscal decisions for schools here without direct approval by voters or another administrative body.

Opponents of two school charter amendments to the ballot this year would have you believe that without such authority (they’re referring to it as full autonomy) our Concord schools and school children will suffer and education will be degraded.

Nothing could be further from the truth. You only have to look at other school districts in the state to know that direct voter input or approval from another political body will lead to outcomes of excellence. Hanover, Bow, and Bedford schools are rated some of the highest in the state and in the country. Nashua opened a new middle school this past August, serving 715 children, that cost $90 million.

The Oyster River School District in Durham opened a new middle school in 2022 serving 660 children for $50 million. (By contrast, Concord’s proposed middle school at Broken Ground is currently pegged at $152 million for 780 children.) There are many more examples of towns and cities across New Hampshire that have created excellent facilities and schools without full fiscal autonomy.

It is important to note that if the two amendments pass, the school board will still have plenty of power to make sound decisions for our schoolchildren. The board will be able to manage curriculum, teachers, students, facilities, and the many other policies involved in giving our children great public education in the city.

What the amendments say is that the board must get approval by a simple majority of votes from Concord residents to move a new middle school to a location other than the current Rundlett location, and the board must get approval by a simple majority of votes to sell, trade or rent the property at the current Rundlett location.

I urge you to read the amendments before voting on them if you want reassurance. You can see the two amendments as they are written (wording approved by the state Attorney General’s office) by watching the school board’s meeting on Sept. 9 on YouTube, accessible on the board’s website.

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These amendments are targeted, limited and reasonable given the conduct of the board. Without rehashing too much, it is important to remember why we are here today. After a lot of public pressure, the board held a few public “listening sessions” where Concord residents turned out in unprecedented numbers to voice support for building a middle school at the current Rundlett site, not at the Broken Ground site, which the board wanted. Residents who turned out were from both sides of the Merrimack River and lived in the neighborhoods that would be directly affected by where a new school would go.

Their concerns fell on deaf ears. In its last meeting before disbanding in December 2023 and ushering in a new school board, the board voted to go forward with its plan to build a massive complex at Broken Ground over the public’s objections. The newly constituted board, made up of many of the same people on the board in 2023, went full bore into planning a middle school at the Broken Ground site. That’s when a group of citizens, following legal procedure, gathered the requisite number of signatures to put on the ballot the two proposed amendments to the school charter.

Many aspects of this immense project continue to worry me. These include soaring costs, currently capped at $152 million. That’s without including the costs of infrastructure like roads, sidewalks, and water, which are still unknown. Or the cost of additional buses since the East Side site would necessitate more, not fewer, children being bussed to school.

The board is still claiming that the construction of the school on the East Side provides equity, but it has never offered a shred of evidence to support this claim. I am especially sad about the destruction of an unspoiled forest at Broken Ground equal to 21 football fields, rich with flora, fauna, wetlands, and hiking and biking trails. It represents open space that could never be recovered.

The school board needs to take a pause on this project. It needs to do a comprehensive study of the Rundlett site and see if building there would be feasible, cost-effective and meet the needs of our students. The board has never done this. The board could do that tomorrow. Instead, the board continues to scare people into thinking Concord children will never get a new middle school if the amendments pass.

As part of the board’s scare campaign, it is threatening lawsuits if the amendments pass, whether by a simple majority or by a “supermajority” of 60 percent, which the board now insists is needed. Ironically, lawsuits by the board would delay the process of building a new middle school even longer, adding to the costs. As importantly, it would thwart the will of a majority of their constituents who want another look at where the new middle school is built.

I have great faith in the ability of the voters in our city to help the board do the right thing here. I also believe that we will have a new middle school soon. The political will is there.