Dear Friends,

HMFH Architects presented the attached Plan for new school construction in Newport. This Plan provides
for every student to be educated in an updated, state of the art educational environment, handicap accessible,
and have greater flexibility for class assignments.

The new Newport Middle School at the Rogers High School Campus will be totally separate and apart from
Rogers High School. There will be absolutely no interaction between grades 9 through 12 and grades 7 and 8.
There will be a separate middle school staff, with guidance counselor(s), and administrator(s). The mean cost
for that aspect of the project will be $3,857,250. With all of the work we are doing at Rogers High School,
Rogers High School and the Newport Middle School will essentially be new schools.

The second aspect of this Plan is providing a new playground at Thompson Middle School where parking is
currently located. This portion of the Plan will be approximately $100,000.

The third portion of the Plan would be to construct a new primary K-2 school at the current site of the
Underwood School. The mean cost would be $18.5M. The mean cost for this total Project would be
$22,527,000. This is opposed to the other options, which have been discussed that are substantially more
expensive. Ranging from a mean low of the one K-4 school of $30,712,000 to a high of $37,684,000 for two
separate Pre-K-4 Schools.

This new Plan, which maximally utilizes space, also obviously is substantially less costly than any other of the
alternatives. Additionally, when you look at the cost to taxpayers over a 20-year bonding period, you can see,
from some of the attached information, that compared to our existing situation, the District will save
$38,418,740 in operating costs and in renovations. The city would gain $24,073,018 in additional revenue in
property sales and new taxes. These figures do not take into consideration other economies of scale with
other professional staff but is a conservative impact only addressing the issue of administrators, secretaries,
and custodians. Additionally, not considered, are the cost savings for heating and fuel by closing five
inefficient elementary schools and creating one new one.

From a cost perspective, the taxpayers and residents should actually save money over the course of a 20-year
bonding period. Additionally, there are great educational benefits by having all the youngsters at one grade
level attend the same school. Appropriate grouping practices and additional targeted assistance and/or
enrichment will be able to be explored as a result of having more youngsters at each grade level at one place.

I know there might be some concerns regarding the middle school location at Rogers High School, but I am
certain that when people see the Plan that is in place, it should allay any concern of having 7th graders with 12th
graders. Truthfully, most people should like that our elementary school model will extend from K-6.

I believe that it is important to take positive actions. We too often complain that nothing ever happens in this
city because no one is willing to take bold measures at risk of offending a small group of people. I believe that
this Plan truly addresses the greater good of the students who attend the Newport Public Schools and will save
resident taxpayers by reducing costs associated with the funding of our public schools.

John H. Ambrogi, Ed. D.