Society Meeting

Details:

We will not be able to meet face-to-face on May 11 to conduct the annual Society meeting. Delay however would postpone a project for several months. For that reason, the Board decided to hold the meeting by way of a paper ballot that will be sent in the mail to all society members.

Timeline:

April 28: A packet of material (including the ballot) will be mailed to your house. It will also be emailed to you. All information except for the budget will be posted to the website.

April 28-May 6: Discussion will take place. If you have any questions about the proposals, email hopeschool@hopeprcschool.org  Questions and answers will be posted here our website so that all can benefit.

May 7: Discussion is complete. Send your ballot by mail or email it to hopeschool@hopeprcschool.org

May 11: Ballots must be in the office by 7:00 PM. Feel free to drop them in the school mailbox

May 12: Results will be emailed out. They will also be included in the Hope Highlights.

Discussion:

From the Building Committee regarding the Remodel & Music Room Proposal:

We have been working diligently to keep this process going as fast and as smooth as possible.  Our main objective has been the Music Room Addition plans.  We have spent most of our time fine tuning these drawings and ideas.  We recently met again with some of the staff to go over the drawings and plans for the office/library remodel part of the proposal.  After this meeting there were small changes that we have made.  Since the remodel part of the project is more than a year out, there will be more revisions to the remodel prints.

Q: You mention that Board members will be elected by simple majority. What about the other items on the ballot?

A: We apologize for this oversight. All items on the agenda will pass by a simple majority except for the building proposals. (Items 6 & 7) These require a 2/3 majority.  

Q: Can we be confident in the integrity of the vote?

A: Yes, we believe we can. As is custom, the counting will be completed by Society members and one retiring Board member. The Board president and secretary will observe. We will verify each vote belongs to a Society member and that each member only votes once.

Q: At my house, we have not seen any large changes in phone/internet charges for several years. Can you provide any more details on the reason for the 65% increase in this utility amount? Perhaps other options for this utility could be investigated?

A: Thank you for the question on this. The previous year’s budget amount for phone/internet and trash is stated incorrectly. The correct amount from last year was $3,600 for phone/internet and $1700 for trash, so the new proposed amount of $2,800 for phone/internet was actually an $800 decrease from last year for phone and internet and no change for the trash. I meant to change this note and last year’s amounts before we posted the budget. Sorry for the mix-up and thank you for bringing this to our attention.

Q: Looking at section views A and D, it appears that the big gym and the music room roofs will both drain onto the new storage and office area, located in between. This area will also probably accumulate significant amounts of snow in the winter. How will this roof area be constructed  to assure that water leaks do not become a recurring problem?

A: The current gymnasium has eavestroughs and downspouts to control water. The new music room will as well. The committee is aware that the maintenance of a relatively flat roof with a membrane is greater than that of a pitched roof. For this reason we asked the architect to make the new music room with a pitched roof. The adjoining areas where the music room connects to the existing structure are sloped as much as possible per the architect. Roofing suppliers also engineer the foam insulation with tapers in it to ensure the water flows off. Membranes are also run up adjacent walls in case there is accumulation of snow.  Creating a leak free and low maintenance roof is of utmost importance to both the building committee and the contractor.

Q: I was wondering why the roof on the music room is not a flat roof, but is a pitched roof.

A: The main reasons we opted for a pitched roof was longevity and lower maintenance. Both flat and pitched roofs can be constructed for a similar cost. The life expectancy of a pitched roof can be up to 40 years with little to no maintenance. Flat roof lifespan however is approximately 20 years and leaks do happen as they get older due to punctures that occur from debris blowing on it during storms etc. The committee deals with minor leaks every winter that pop up and we are trying to reduce this occurrence. The committee also thought that a pitched roof would aesthetically look fine with the gymnasium and Jr high roofs being pitched as well.

Q: I couldn’t make out the dimensions of the music room, and wondered if you are confident that it’s large enough to handle a larger student body if that would occur?

A: The dimensions of the room itself are approximately 50′ x 60′ with a dropped acoustical ceiling, height at around 13′.  In addition to that, there is a 10′ storage and office area along the east side where the majority of the room attaches to the school. The Committee is confident that this room size will properly serve Hope School well into the future. For comparison, the room is sized almost the same as the one at Heritage, which serves them well having a much larger student body.  When designing the music room, we had to consider the current size of our student body, the potential growth, and how to make the acoustics work properly for both band and choir. In a room that is too big, you “get lost” due to size, and you start to get reverb from sound which is difficult to mitigate. To sum it up, we feel that with this proposed size we will not have skimped nor overbuilt. 

Downloads

• Society Meeting Ballot
• Building Project Proposals and Information
• Annual Secretary’s Report 2020
• Foundation Committee Report 2020