How the $95 million Essex school compares with other new elementary schools

The proposed Essex Elementary School would cost about $1,038 per square foot to build. That is more than any of six comparable new elementary schools the Massachusetts School Building Authority has priced since mid-2024. Those six range from $726 to $964.

Voters in Essex and Manchester-by-the-Sea will be asked to approve the $95.3 million project at town meetings on Nov. 16, then in ballot votes on Dec. 10. As the votes near, residents are asking whether the price is in line with what other towns are paying.

The Current compared the Essex estimate with state figures for similar projects. Every comparison below shows its date, its source, its unit, why that school was picked, and what data is missing. Tap any school for the details.

How to read the yellow tags. A tag such as "2 data gaps" counts the facts a fair comparison would need that the public record does not supply for that school. Examples: the project has not gone out to bid, so its price is still an estimate; the state did not list a construction start date; or the town has not published its site costs. Tap the school to see each gap. More gaps mean the number deserves more caution, not that it is wrong.

Terms used in this story

State board

The board of the Massachusetts School Building Authority, which decides which projects get state money and how much.

Schematic design

The stage where a school's size, layout and systems are set well enough to price. Every estimate in the comparison chart comes from this stage.

Gross square feet

The building's total floor area, including hallways, walls and mechanical rooms.

Construction cost

What the builder is paid: the building, site work, demolition, markups and a cushion for price increases until the middle of construction.

Total project cost

Construction plus design fees, project management, furniture, technology and contingency.

Effective reimbursement rate

The share of the total cost the state actually pays. It is lower than the district's base rate because the state caps the space and costs it will help pay for.

Equalized valuation

The state's estimate of the full market value of all property in a town. The regional agreement uses it to split building costs.

Debt exclusion

A ballot vote that lets a town raise taxes above the Proposition 2½ limit only to pay a specific debt, and only until it is paid off.

Interactive

Compare Essex with similar projects

State schematic design estimates for new elementary schools, plus the Essex estimate. Dollars are as reported, not adjusted for inflation, unless you check the 2026 prices box.

Construction per sq ft Total cost per sq ft Cost per student State share

Show older local schools Adjust older schools to 2026 prices

Essex (proposed)Comparable projectOlder local school, history only2 data gaps facts the record does not supply

Proposed estimate Essex, not yet approved by the state boardBid, under construction contractor bids are in; chart still shows the state estimate so all rows compare the same thingEstimate, price not yet set approved by the state board; no bid or guaranteed price yetBuilt, bid price price set by contractor bids

How the projects were picked

The state's cost report for elementary schools lists five recent projects as starting points: Kittredge in North Andover, Shaker Lane in Littleton, Killam in Reading, Berkley Community in Berkley and Greylock in North Adams. All five are new buildings, like the Essex plan. The Current added one more by applying the same test to the full state list: new construction, approved by the state board in June 2024 or later, and designed for 240 to 460 students. That added Fox Hill in Burlington.

Central in East Bridgewater is shown because the Essex project team cited it at an Aug. 25 community meeting. It is larger, with 510 students. Three older local schools appear only when you ask for them: Gloucester's West Parish and East Gloucester, and Manchester Memorial. Their prices date from 2014 to 2022 and reflect a cheaper market.

The Essex school is designed for 250 students in kindergarten through grade 5, plus 30 prekindergarten students. Per-student figures for Essex use the 250. Counting all 280, the total cost per student is about $340,000, still above every comparable project.

Why Essex costs more

The records point to three factors. They do not say how much of the gap each one explains.

Later timing. Each estimate includes inflation up to the middle of that project's construction. Essex officials have said the estimate assumes bids in 2028, with students moving in around 2029 or 2030. The comparable projects that list a start date were priced to begin building in 2026 or early 2027.

Small size. At 72,443 square feet, Essex is the second smallest building in the group. Some costs, like site work, kitchens and mechanical systems, do not shrink much with the building, so they weigh more heavily per square foot and per student.

More space than the state funds. In its review of the early design, the state authority said the district's plan for 250 students exceeded state space guidelines by 22,688 square feet. The state generally does not reimburse space above its guidelines. That helps explain why the state is expected to pay about 20.6% of the Essex project, while its share of the comparable projects runs from 31% to 65%. The district's base reimbursement rate is 31%, officials said at a Sept. 23 meeting in Manchester. Caps on space and cost bring the effective rate down to about 20%.

The project team has said the building has almost no extra space left to cut without changing the educational program, which would send the project back to the state for a new review. Read that story.

What has driven prices up

Federal price data show how much the cost of building a school has risen since the district bid its last new school. Manchester Memorial set its price in January 2020. Since then, the federal index of what contractors charge to build new schools has risen 40.0%, to August 2026. Over the same stretch, Boston-area consumer prices rose 26.1%.

That index comes from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, which surveys contractors on what they bid for new school buildings. It is national, not Massachusetts only, and it measures the price of the same kind of work over time. A building that changes in size or design is a separate matter.

Chart

School construction prices have outpaced everyday inflation

Index, January 2019 = 100. Monthly, through August 2026 (construction wages are quarterly, through the second quarter of 2026; Boston prices through July 2026).

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: Producer Price Index for new school building construction (PCU236222236222) and construction materials (WPUSI012011); Employment Cost Index, construction wages and salaries (CIU2022300000000I); Consumer Price Index, Boston area (CUURA103SA0). Accessed through the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis FRED database, Oct. 3, 2026. Unit: index points, rebased so January 2019 equals 100. Missing: a Massachusetts-only school price index does not exist in federal data; recent months are preliminary and can be revised for four months.

Materials rose faster than labor. The federal construction materials index is up 61.1% since January 2020, while construction wages are up 26.5%. Metals and electrical equipment led the way.

Chart

Price change for school building inputs since Manchester Memorial's bid

Percent change, January 2020 to August 2026. The column at right shows the change over the past year.

Source: U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Producer Price Indexes and Employment Cost Index (series IDs on each row), via FRED, accessed Oct. 3, 2026. Unit: percent change in price index; producer prices are what makers and suppliers charge, before delivery and installation. Why these items: they are the main materials and systems in a school like the one planned for Essex. Missing: the Essex estimate does not break out how much it assumes for each item; August 2026 values are preliminary.

Fuel. Diesel runs the trucks, excavators and generators on a job site and the plants that make concrete and steel. In New England, retail diesel averaged $6.31 a gallon in September 2026, the highest monthly price in federal records, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration. That is up from $3.96 a year earlier and $3.13 in January 2020. The federal producer price index for diesel is up 77.8% over the past year.

Tariffs. Federal tariffs on imported steel and aluminum rose to 50% on June 4, 2025, and a 50% tariff on most copper products followed on Aug. 1, 2025. An April 2026 proclamation applied those duties to the full value of imported products made with those metals, including steel structures, doors, windows and aluminum building parts. Steel mill prices are up 23.4% and copper 20.9% over the past year. The Essex project team named steel tariffs as one cause of the higher price.

What inflation alone explains

Adjusting old prices with the federal school construction index puts the area's three most recent new schools in a narrow band. In August 2026 prices, Manchester Memorial's $534 per square foot becomes about $748, West Parish's $457 becomes about $749 and East Gloucester's $574 becomes about $713. Use the "Adjust older schools to 2026 prices" box in the comparison chart to see them next to Essex.

Essex is estimated at $1,038. That estimate assumes bids in 2028 and includes inflation to the middle of construction. If school construction prices keep rising at the past year's rate of 5.2%, Memorial's adjusted price would reach about $825 by 2028, by the Current's arithmetic. That leaves roughly $210 a square foot that general price increases do not explain. The records point to the design itself: tighter energy code requirements such as triple glazed windows and more insulation, which the project team has cited, and the small building and site work described above.

The 2028 figure is the Current's projection, not a forecast by the district or the state. It assumes school construction prices keep rising at 5.2% a year.

Estimates versus contract prices

An estimate is the design team's forecast. A contract price is what a builder actually agreed to charge. For the comparable projects that have signed contracts, and for every design-bid-build school in the state's records since 2014, the Current lined up the two.

Three of this year's comparable projects bid below their state estimates: Greylock by about 5%, Fox Hill by about 14% and Killam by roughly 26%. Across 37 state-funded elementary schools bid since 2014, 28 came in under the estimate, and the typical bid was 6.9% lower. The exception was 2022 and 2023, when pandemic-era prices pushed several bids over.

Chart

Estimate versus contract price, recent projects

Construction cost per square foot. Open circle: state schematic design estimate. Solid dot: contract price at bid. The dashed line marks the Essex estimate.

EstimateContract under estimateContract over estimate

Source: MSBA schematic design estimates (as of June 2026 board meeting) and bid results (as of April 29, 2026); 2026 contracts from iBerkshires (Greylock), Burlington Buzz (Fox Hill) and the Reading building committee's June 15 meeting (Killam), with status confirmed in the MSBA August 2026 project report. Unit: construction cost per gross square foot; 2026 figures are the Current's math, contract divided by the state's square footage. Why these schools: the newest new elementary schools with signed contracts. Data gaps: Berkley Community also bid in 2026 but its amount is not published; no official bid tabulation was found for the 2026 contracts; the state did not list Hatherly's bid date.

Chart

How bids compared with estimates, 2014 to 2026

Each dot is one state-funded new or renovated elementary school, placed by the year it bid. Below the line means the bid came in under the estimate. Dots with a dark ring are the three 2026 contracts, taken from local reports.

Source: same as above. Unit: percent difference between the contract price and the schematic design estimate, total construction cost. Why these schools: every design-bid-build elementary project in the state's bid file since 2014, plus the three 2026 contracts. Data gaps: projects built by a construction manager at risk are left out, because in the state's file their estimate often already equals the negotiated price (12 of 25 within 1%); four projects in the bid file had no matching estimate; Hatherly has no bid date and is not plotted.

What about final costs? A contract price is not the final bill. Change orders, unforeseen site conditions and contingency spending move the final cost up or down. The state audits each project at closeout, but its public cost files list estimates and bids, not final spending, so final costs could not be compared here.

The pattern does not guarantee a lower price for Essex. Bids depend on the market when a project goes out, and the Essex team's spring cost table listed a construction manager at risk for the new building, a method in which the price is negotiated rather than set by open bids.

How the price moved

Source: Essex School Building Committee slides, Sept. 22 and Sept. 29, 2026; state review comments in the Preferred Schematic Report. The project team said the January and spring figures were for comparing options only.

The other options

Before choosing a new building, the committee priced seven options in the spring. The project team said those figures were only for comparing options, so they are lower than today's $95.3 million for the chosen design.

Source: Preferred Schematic Report cost review, as presented at the Aug. 25, 2026 community meeting (estimates issued March 11, 2026). Unit: dollars, rounded by the project team; state share assumed a 12% to 21% effective rate. Data gaps: options were priced for comparison, not as final budgets; the PreK to 3 options would send Essex fourth and fifth graders to Manchester Memorial.

Why not repair the old building? Repair was the cheapest option on paper, with an estimated local cost of $53 million. The project team rejected it for several reasons, according to its slides: it would not meet the educational program the state approved, so state money would be limited and uncertain; work would happen in an occupied building, likely with temporary modular classrooms; and it would leave the site's traffic and play area problems in place. A 2023 facilities study found the existing building needs about $9 million in work, including a roof and major mechanical systems, just to keep it running.

Why not one school in Manchester? The regional agreement requires the district to keep an elementary school in each town. The Memorial site is already tight, and changing a recently finished state-funded school could require paying back part of that grant, the district says.

Who pays

The regional school agreement splits building costs between the two towns. Half is based on each town's state equalized property value and half on its population in the 2020 Census. With the latest values, Manchester would pay about 65.8% and Essex about 34.2%. That puts Essex's share of the $75.7 million local cost at about $25.9 million and Manchester's at about $49.8 million.

The split uses the property values in effect before each bond sale, so a new state valuation due in early 2027 could move it slightly.

For budget context, Essex already pays the district $1.27 million this year for debt on Manchester Memorial and the middle and high school. The Memorial debt runs to 2049. The middle and high school debt ends sooner: one bond in 2030 and the other in 2033. Essex pays $471,967 on those bonds this year and Manchester $962,222, so those payments will stop as the new school debt starts. Officials from both towns said in September they support using short-term borrowing at first and waiting to sell long-term bonds until the high school debt is paid off, the Current reported. Essex's full town budget this year is $24.5 million.

Current estimate, not a district figure

What could the school add to your tax bill?

Your assessed value

$

Essex average home Manchester average home

Interest rate3.5%4.0%4.5% Years2530

$0

a year, once full payments begin

TownEssex

Per $1,000 of value$0

Town's yearly payment$0

Town's share of $75.7M$0

Enrollment

Essex Elementary had 200 students in kindergarten through grade 5 on Oct. 1, 2025, down from 364 in the fall of 2000. Prekindergarten is now held at Manchester Memorial; the new school would bring 30 prekindergarten seats to Essex. Enrollment has held between 189 and 231 since 2016.

The design enrollment of 250 comes from the state's 2024 projection, which expected Essex enrollment to rise. It projected 261 students for 2024 to 2025 and 254 for this school year, climbing to about 289 by 2031. Actual enrollment was 215 last year and 200 this year. The state based its number on a 10-year average of its projection, 243, plus an adjustment for students who leave for other schools. The town's answers to the state's housing questions listed several possible projects in Essex and noted that some may never be built.

Chart

Essex Elementary enrollment, kindergarten to grade 5

Students on Oct. 1 of each school year. Bars are actual enrollment; dots are the state's 2024 projection. The dashed line marks the design enrollment of 250, not counting prekindergarten.

Source: Mass. Department of Elementary and Secondary Education enrollment data, fall 2000 through fall 2025, and Massachusetts School Building Authority enrollment projection for Essex Elementary, June 2024. Data gaps: the projection is the state's, made in 2024; it does not count prekindergarten.

Will there be enough students?

Federal and state population data show a town that is getting older, with a steady but not growing number of families with children, and fewer births than a generation ago.

The number of children in town has held roughly steady: 823 residents under 18 in 2010 and 817 in 2020. The Census Bureau's newer survey, covering 2020 to 2024, puts the median age at 45.0 and counts 455 households with anyone under 18, but its margins of error, about 3 years and 70 households, are too wide to show a change since 2020.

Chart

Births to Essex residents

Births each calendar year, 2001 to 2023. The dashed lines mark the average for 2001 to 2010 and for 2014 to 2023.

Source: Massachusetts Department of Public Health birth data, as reported in the MSBA enrollment projection for Essex Elementary, June 2024. Unit: births. Data gaps: 2024 births were not final when the state's study was done, so the chart stops at 2023; the state's study assumes about 30 births a year going forward.

The state's official population projections, from the UMass Donahue Institute, show Essex peaking and then slowly shrinking, from 3,675 people in 2020 to about 3,470 in 2035. They show children declining faster than the town. Residents ages 5 to 14 fall from 479 in 2020 to about 402 in 2030 and 353 in 2035, a drop of about 26%. Residents 65 and older grow from 694 to about 851.

Chart

Essex children, counted and projected

Residents ages 5 to 14 and under 5. 2010 and 2020 are Census counts; 2025 and later are the state's projection.

Ages 5 to 14Under 5

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, 2010 and 2020 Census; UMass Donahue Institute Vintage 2024 population projections for Massachusetts cities and towns (May 2024). Unit: residents. Data gaps: projections are made in five-year steps and launched from the 2020 Census; they do not count children who attend school elsewhere or new housing that has not been built.

Two state forecasts point in opposite directions. The school building authority's 2024 enrollment projection, the basis for the 250-student design, expected Essex Elementary to grow to about 280 students in the early 2030s. Its first two years have already come in well below it: it projected 261 and 254 students, and the school had 215 and 200. The UMass Donahue projection, by contrast, has the town's school-age population falling.

If Essex Elementary keeps enrolling the same share of the town's children ages 5 to 14 that it does now, the UMass Donahue numbers point to roughly 160 students around 2035, by the Current's arithmetic, leaving a 250-seat school about two-thirds full. That is a projection built on a projection and should be read as a rough range, not a forecast. New housing, families moving in or a change in which grades attend which school could move it in either direction.

If either town votes no

Both towns must approve. Under state school building authority policy, a district has 120 days from the state board's approval to secure local funding. After a failed vote, the district must send the state a plan to fix it within 10 business days, and the state decides whether to keep holding the money. "A failed local vote likely will result in the school district being required to submit a new Statement of Interest," the policy says, which means applying again and waiting for a new invitation.

The existing building would still need the roughly $9 million in repairs identified in 2023, without state help.

What we don't know yet

• Two sets of grant figures. The district's project FAQ says the state grant is $20.35 million and the local share $74.95 million. The Sept. 29 committee slides say $19.6 million and $75.7 million. This story uses the slides, which are newer. The district says both are estimates until bids come in.
• The district's own tax estimate. Officials have said they will rerun the financing plan to show the yearly cost for an average taxpayer. Read more.
• The size of the current building. The design report says 53,036 square feet; the FAQ says 55,600.
• A breakdown of the Essex estimate. Site costs and inflation allowances for Essex have not been published. The committee's Sept. 29 comparison slides were posted as images without figures we could check.
• Final costs for the comparable projects. Four comparable projects have bid and are under construction; Berkley's bid amount is not published. Shaker Lane and Central will set their prices in 2027, and Kittredge has not bid. None is finished, and the state does not publish final spending in these reports.

What's next

• Oct. 7: Essex School Building Committee community meeting, 6 to 8 p.m., Essex Elementary School cafeteria, per the district calendar. Earlier committee slides listed Oct. 8.
• Nov. 16: Town meetings in both towns. Approval needs a two-thirds vote in each.
• Dec. 10: Ballot votes in each town to exclude the debt from Proposition 2½ limits. A simple majority is needed.