Springfield Committee Clears $645,000 Land Taking for New Horace Mann School

Town Board · Meeting of July 28, 2026

Springfield's Maintenance and Development Committee advanced a $645,000 land-taking order for the new Horace Mann School at Chestnut Street. Committee Chairman LeVar Click-Bruce, City Council President Whitfield, and Councilwoman Maria Perez voted unanimously Monday to send two related orders to the full City Council for action the same evening. Peter Garvey, the city's director of Capital Asset Construction, told the committee the $645,000 covers three parcels: a four-family residential property at $535,000, an adjacent lot at $65,000, and an empty Massasoit Street lot at $45,000.

The costs are entirely city-funded, with no state reimbursement available. Four families living in the four-family parcel face relocation, a process Garvey estimated at four to eight months; relocation costs will come before the council in a separate future order. The 138,000-square-foot school, slightly smaller than the 155,000-square-foot DeBerry-Swan building, will include 13 preschool classrooms, three cohorts per grade, and 170 parking spaces.

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Source: the Town Board meeting of July 28, 2026, reported from the official video recording and transcript.

Checked against the record: before publication this article was automatically compared with the meeting transcript.