$9 Million in Bonds Approved

      Voters in the Sag Harbor School District on Nov. 13 approved two bonds, totaling $9 million, for renovations to Pierson High School, its athletic fields, and the Sag Harbor Elementary School.

       A $7.4 million bond earmarked for renovating the Pierson auditorium, adding music instruction rooms, refurbishing shop and technology classrooms, and adding storage space to the elementary school gymnasium passed easily by a margin of 740 votes to 369.

       A $1.6 million bond calling for the installation of a turf athletic field and walking track behind the high school faced a tougher test, passing 585 to 507.

       The work, which will include renovations of the Pierson kitchen, plumbing, electrical and heating upgrades, energy conservation measures, and work on the elementary school parking lots and Pierson bus parking lot, will begin next fall and is expected to be wrapped up by fall 2015.

       John O’Keefe, the district’s business official, said this week that “the district is very excited” that both measures passed.

       If they had not, he said, many of the proposed upgrades would have to be handled in a piecemeal basis with money provided out of the district’s annual operating budget, a prospect, he said, that would have delayed the outcome and likely resulted in higher costs.

       A bond calling for similar upgrades was defeated in 2009.

       District officials have estimated that the two bonds will result in a tax hike of approximately $126 a year for a house valued at $1 million on the East Hampton Town side of the district and about $120 a year for a house of that value on the Southampton Town side.