For more than nine months, City Councilor Tim Rooke has waged a campaign against the decision— made last year by the Finance Control Board, and supported by the Sarno administration—to move the School Department headquarters to 1550 Main St., the site of the old federal courthouse. Rooke calls the move a very bad deal, noting that, between the $10.86 per square foot in rent and $2.8 million in renovations to be picked up by the city, city taxpayers will be paying significantly more than they would for better-quality space elsewhere downtown. And he’s repeatedly asked why City Hall didn’t conduct a competitive bidding process for a new School Department site, to ensure the city was getting the best deal.
Over the months, Rooke’s press for answers has escalated—he’s asked Sarno to debate him publicly on the matter, floated the idea of filing a lawsuit over the deal, and raised the possibility of stripping funding for the lease from the city budget. Meanwhile, Sarno has, for the most part, refused to engage, beyond repeated assertions that the move is a good one, and will keep a prime piece of downtown real estate from “going dark.”
But now, it appears, the mayor has taken off his gloves. On Monday, Rooke—who chairs the Council’s Finance Committee—sent a one-sentence email to Lee Erdman, the city’s chief administrative and financial officer, informing him that he didn’t plan to schedule any committee meetings until the city sought public bids for the new School Department office. In response, Sarno’s office issued a press release saying Rooke was “playing politics and jeopardizing the City’s financial position at the expense of the City’s taxpayers.”
The release included this quote from Sarno: “I’m extremely disappointed over Councilor Rooke’s nonfeasance and the fact that he seems unconcerned that his conduct will ultimately result in the taxpayers of Springfield paying the price.” Sarno listed several items that need to be addressed by the Finance Committee, including payment of certain city bills and a mandate from the Department of Revenue concerning city deficits.
“It’s very clear that Councilor Rooke is against the School Department’s move to 1550 Main Street but his ongoing criticism is counter-productive to what the City is attempting to accomplish,” Sarno continued. “The school department move will bring hundreds of employees to the heart of downtown Springfield which will generate additional customers for downtown business. … This is a win win for the City and for downtown economic development.”
Rooke isn’t the only critic of the School Department move to tangle with the mayor. School Committee member Antonette Pepe—who, after Rooke, has been perhaps the most vocal critic—has accused Sarno of trying to politically pressure her into shutting up about her concerns over the deal. In December, Pepe appeared on Rock 102’s Bax & O’Brien show, where she reported that Sarno had told her he’d withhold his previously promised support of her bid to become the new vice chair of the School Committee only if she “kept [her] mouth shut” about the federal building issue and promised to “support [School Superintendent] Dr. Ingram at all costs.”
Sarno—who, in fact, went on to support new Committee member Norman Roldan for the vice chairmanship—denied Pepe’s claim.
