Read more in the Cape Cod Times
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The Massachusetts State Senate voted yesterday afternoon on a supplemental budget to close out Fiscal Year 2017 and enable the state to pay some of its outstanding bills, including $49.8 million for snow and ice removal and more than $20 million for state sheriffs. The supplemental budget also includes language to increase the state’s contribution to the building of a new facility for Cape Cod Regional Technical High School, increasing the state’s contribution to the project by $5.3 million. This additional contribution from the state will save Cape taxpayers nearly $10 million when taking into account the interest that would accrue to the towns.
Senator Julian Cyr (D-Truro) championed the inclusion of this language in the supplemental budget adopted in the Senate. Representative Sarah Peake (D-Provincetown) secured identical language in the supplemental budget passed yesterday by the House. The measure now goes to the Governor for his signature.
“This measure will save local taxpayers millions of dollars and help our communities finance the proposed $128 million Cape Tech project,” said Senator Cyr. “I am proud to be a part of the collaborative work has been done to ensure high school students on Cape Cod have access to high quality and innovative technical education.”
“The Massachusetts School Building Authority can now reopen the determination of the state’s contribution to the Cape Tech building project and use the highest year when calculating the “proportion of economically disadvantaged students” in the district, thus increasing the state’s contribution by 5.67 reimbursement points for the project,” said Representative Peake. “The state will now pick up 51.12% of the eligible costs, where they would have previously only carried 45.45% of the eligible costs.”
Superintendent of the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School, Robert Sanborn, expressed his gratitude to Senator Cyr and Representative Sarah Peake for shepherding this language through the Legislature.
“Thank you to Representative Sarah Peake for spearheading this initiative in the House, and to Senator Cyr for ensuring its adoption in the Senate,” said Sanborn. “The collaboration between all members of the Cape and Islands legislative delegation on this project has been phenomenal.”
A district-wide election will be held on October 24th to authorize the debt for the project.
The supplementary budget bill will now go to a conference committee. However, due to its inclusion in both the House and Senate versions of the bill, the Cape Cod Regional Technical High School proposal cannot be altered during conference.