Lexington voters on Monday approved replacing their 70-year-old high school campus with a new building for $660 million, which will become one of the most expensive public school projects in Massachusetts.
The vote was 5,283 in favor and 3,276 opposed , according to preliminary results released Monday night.
The special election capped off more than a year of debate about whether residents had the appetite to increase their property taxes for about 30 years to fund the construction costs. The Massachusetts School Building Authority is subsidizing some costs with grants, which could total $121.7 million.
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The project’s eye-popping price tag comes as school construction costs have been soaring . Much of that has been driven by rising costs for steel, cement, and other materials; a labor shortage in the trades; and higher interest rates on the bonds needed to finance the projects.
Those factors contributed to the high construction costs for Lexington High, which serves one of the largest student bodies in the state. The new building will be constructed on the school’s football field and is slated to open for the 2029-2030 school year.
School district leaders as well as many parents, students, and educators say the project is a long overdue investment to address overcrowding at a campus that was designed to accommodate 1,800 students but currently has about 2,400 students.
The multibuilding campus also is plagued with outdated science labs, an HVAC system that keeps classrooms too hot or too cold, and steam pipes that have sprung leaks.
Related: Debate in Lexington intensifies over $660 million high school
Opponents, however, said the project is too expensive and questioned whether the new building will be big enough.
The new school is being designed for its current enrollment of 2,400 students, but Lexington is bracing for an influx of school-aged children from new multifamily housing that is expected to be constructed on more than 225 acres that Town Meeting voters rezoned under the MBTA Communities law.
Consequently, opponents urged school district leaders to scrap the school project in favor of rebuilding the current campus in phases until they get a better sense of future enrollment.
School district leaders said rebuilding the current campus in phases would be too disruptive to students and that a prolonged construction time line could lead to higher costs.
Predicting enrollment for the project has been tricky because it is not known if all the land will be developed and how soon it might happen. Lexington also is experiencing declining enrollment in its elementary schools, which could be offset by new families moving to town.
A town consultant so far has estimated a modest enrollment increase based on more than 1,000 multifamily units currently in the pipeline.
For the owner of a home with a median assessed value of $1.4 million, the annual tax increase could range between less than $50 to about $1,800 during the peak years of the project payments, according to town estimates.
Proponents scored a victory at Town Meeting in November when members overwhelmingly approved appropriating the necessary funds to build the new school. That move, however, was contingent on voters approving the property tax increases to generate those funds.
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