Sports Field Replacement Finds its Way Through Town Meeting

Any hope of holding Town Meeting to three nights was quickly extinguished last night as Town Meeting Members and community members engaged in more than two hours of debate about Article 25, which requested $6.7 million for sports field replacement at Marshall Simonds Middle School.

As promised, the moderator started the conversation afresh to ensure all attendees were on the same page—and there were certainly more attendees than usual. Around 20 community members, including children, attended the meeting to show their support for the article and urge the body to prioritize the fields they play on as participants and coaches in youth sports and as members of the Burlington community.

The presentation began with Ways & Means, which at least one Town Meeting Member told the Moderator afterward was unusual. After the Article and Ways & Means vote were presented—along with the arguments in favor and against it—the School Committee, Capital Budget Committee, and Recreation Commission all presented their votes. And after all the votes were shared, Operations Director Bob Cunha presented on the history and present state of both the Marshall Simonds fields and the planning for field maintenance and replacement.

One of the main arguments in favor of the article was that Burlington youth has continually had to pay the price for the lack of a comprehensive field plan and that Burlington is not competitive with other districts in this regard. Cunha pointed to the effort the district had put into planning for the fields overall (see this very comprehensive field study from 2022) and to the conceptual designs the district facilities committee had created for this project in particular.

Those who opposed bringing this article forward now held that they are in support of updating the fields but not with a comprehensive financial plan. This project, says Ways & Means Chair, John Iler, has not been a part of the town's capital plans and therefore couldn't be forecast—and in the larger picture, the town doesn't have a comprehensive capital plan for field replacement and maintenance and the advisory bodies wished to wait until one is created, which will hopefully happen after the Recreation Department's study is incorporated with the School Department's. (Note: in the 2023 capital plan, $900,000 was projected for resurfacing the track in FY2024; in the 2024 capital plan, $1,000,000 was allocated for the same in FY2026.)

The other elephant in the room was the recently-approved police station ($46 million) and the proposed Fox Hill (~$63 million at last estimate) and High School (cost not yet determined) building projects, which have not yet been approved by Town Meeting and some feel might be endangered by this large field allocation.

Two amendments were proposed during this discussion. The first was to take $550,000 in free cash to design the project and bring the fully designed and bidded-out project to Town Meeting next year; this amendment failed. The second, initially proposed last Wednesday, was to postpone the work on the turf and track and approve $4.7 million for replacing the grass field with turf. This amendment ultimately passed, and the body voted on it after hearing from community members and proponents in the body. After three votes and ultimately a roll call, the article passed with the 2/3 majority it needed (78-28), and the sports field replacement will proceed through bonding.

This isn't the first time citizens have shown up to Town Meeting to have their voices heard. Most recently, a group of residents near the Herb Chambers Kia dealership attended two separate Town Meetings to speak out against the dealership's expansion, an Article which ended up failing the 2/3 test by a very slim margin.

Later in the meeting, the Recreation Department was allocated another $200,000 for field maintenance and repair such as top dressing and new backstops and bleachers. Check out the Warrant Summary for a full readout of the articles that were voted on, and tune in on Wednesday for what will likely be the final evening of Town Meeting, as the remaining zoning Articles—including Article 30 about changing the Town Clerk's office from an elected to an appointed position and Article 31 regarding the MBTA Communities Overlay District—are discussed.