The Cabot Creamery building at Mad River Park in Waitsfield is being considered as a possible multi-town Valley elementary school as the school district works on merging schools.
The Harwood Unified Union School District board’s building use and visioning committee held a preliminary discussion about purchasing the Cabot Creamery building in Mad River Park as a new Valley elementary school on Aug. 18. At that meeting, the committee members recommended that the full board explore the possibilities that purchasing the building presents.
REC FIELDS
In July, Cabot announced that the building was for sale for $2.95 million. The building is 32,000 square feet and is located on 7.5 acres off Airport Road in Waitsfield. It adjoins the recreation fields at the Mad River Park.
To effectively consolidate the local elementary schools, the district will need a building that can accommodate about 450 students, which the Cabot building could. If the purchase happens, HUUSD will need to do some retrofitting, including building a gymnasium and cafeteria. School board member and committee member J.B. Weir said there are no cost estimates on retrofitting costs yet, as the work is just beginning.
HUUSD superintendent Mike Leichliter said that Nick Managan of Cabot Creamery approached him in July to discuss Cabot’s plans to sell the building and move, telling him that Cabot would be interested in selling to the school district. Weir visited the site along with school board chair Ashley Woods, Warren and Cindy Senning, Duxbury. Board leadership spoke favorably about exploring the purchase.
At this week’s meeting, the committee recommended an RPF for architectural services to consider the costs. Previous estimates have put the cost of building a new elementary school at $60-$70 million.
BUS RIDE LENGTH
During work the district did with the architectural firm TruexCullins in 2023 and 2024, the firm detailed options for consolidation based on the goal of having one or two Valley elementary schools, one middle school, one high school and one Waterbury/Duxbury elementary school. Currently, there are primary schools in Waterbury, Warren, Waitsfield, Fayston and Moretown, plus a middle school at Harwood and one in Duxbury. All district students share a single high school.
A primary concern during that earlier work was how long students, particularly elementary school students, would have to ride buses if elementary schools were consolidated. The Cabot building has the advantages of being located fairly centrally for many students from Waitsfield, Warren, Moretown and parts of Fayston. From Warren village, it is a little over nine miles to the Cabot building.
SMALLER SCHOOLS
HUUSD is again working on school consolidation plans that include closing four Valley elementary schools and merging those students into one newer/possibly newly constructed building. This comes after state legislators have passed two years of legislation mandating increased school district sizes and closing of smaller schools.
Cabot announced plans to sell building earlier this summer. Cabot moved to the site in 2014. It had formerly housed Northern Power Systems.
