VT Gubernatorial Candidate Aly Richards and VT State Senate Candidate Ben Brickner Tour Failing WUHSMS Building

Candidates express concern for conditions in beleaguered building as VT Agency of Education again withholds approvals for shovel-ready rebuild

WOODSTOCK, VT -- July 27, 2026 -- Vermont Democratic Gubernatorial candidate Aly Richards joined Vermont State Senate candidate Ben Brickner and a team of Mountain Views Supervisory District (MVSD) senior administrators last Wednesday for a tour of the district’s failing, 70-year-old Woodstock Union High School and Middle School (WUHSMS) building. The structure is now considered to be among the worst cases of school-building deterioration in Vermont.

Leading the tour for MVSD were Superintendent Sherry Sousa, WUHSMS Principal Aaron Cinquemani, and MVSD Facilities Director Joe Rigoli. 

Aly Richards, the former CEO of Let’s Grow Kids, is recognized statewide for her work to advance both early childhood education reform and affordability. Her leadership is credited for driving the passage in 2023 of Act 76, landmark legislation that brought meaningful investment and important policy changes to the State’s early childhood education system.

Ben Brickner is Pomfret’s Selectboard Chair with a track record of community leadership. His seven years of bringing neighbors together across town lines have prepared him to represent Windsor County, Thetford, and Pittsfield in the Vermont Senate.

The tour was scheduled to illustrate the dangerous “catch-22” dilemma in which MVSD now struggles as a direct result of inaction by the State. The district has spent 10 years carefully planning its WUHSMS rebuild. Its taxpayers have invested nearly $2 million (not to mention hundreds of thousands of volunteer hours) to responsibly develop a project to replace the crumbling school building in accordance with state guidance. And its voters have resoundingly passed a $112 million bond to finance the new construction. But in the face of all these achievements, the Vermont Agency of Education (AOE) is now refusing to grant final construction approval. Despite the clear urgency to replace the unhealthy and unsafe building, the AOE declined for the third time last week to approve the rebuild in a letter from the Agency’s Secretary, Zoie Saunders. Moving forward without AOE’s approval could be penalized by a forfeiture of State construction aid.

While Saunders acknowledged MVSD’s “difficult position,” she wrote in a letter dated the same day as the tour, “The Agency cannot approve any district for school construction aid until the program rules have been adopted. Under current law,” she stated, “that rulemaking process is required to be completed by March of 2028. Until those rules are in place, we do not have legal authority to approve projects.”

Under Act 73 (and restated in Act 170 this June), the AOE has for more than a year had the funding and the mandate to hire experts who, once seated, will be tasked with writing the new rules required for the future appropriation of construction funds to needy school districts. However, those experts are still not in place. In essence, the AOE is withholding its construction approval based on rules that do not exist and may not exist for up to three years.

“It's clear to me that the communities in the Mountain Views Supervisory District care deeply about their kids and their schools,” said Richards. “They need a partner in the governor's office who will not only match that level of care and consideration, but also provide true partnership to seek equitable and affordable solutions. I'm ready to be that partner for school communities throughout Vermont. "

Notably, in January 2024 and September 2025, the AOE actually did grant preliminary approvals for the WUHSMS rebuild project, but the agency now calls those approvals “defunct.” However, after legal review, MVSD reports that no language exists anywhere in Act 73 or Act 170 that would render the two approvals or the laws that generated them obsolete.

The tour 

Wednesday’s tour agenda began with a 30-minute briefing on the state of the structure and the escalating costs required to repair it hosted by Superintendent Sousa. The briefing was followed by a walking tour led by Joe Rigoli that began with a close inspection of work underway to replace cast-iron sewer pipes beneath the food-preparation areas of the cafeteria, nearby lavatories, and the hallway to staff parking areas. 

Rigoli also showed the increasingly concerned candidates the school’s boiler room, where a failed boiler is now being replaced by two new propane boilers. Both the sewer and boiler replacements were funded by voters last March, when a strong majority passed two bonds to the tune of $.5 million just to keep the school running. 

The visit included stops in the antiquated boys’ shower room, where only one shower is presently operational, archaic locker rooms, and the gymnasium, where sensors had to be installed that could alert student athletes and those attending sports events of any potential ceiling collapse that could occur due to the weight of snow. 

“The need is impossible to miss: our kids and their teachers report daily to a high school that is nearly seventy years old and failing around them,” said Brickner, also a Pomfret parent, following the tour. “Voters across our seven towns approved a new school in March by a 22-point margin. They have done their parts, and now the state needs to come to the table and do its part. This is exactly the gap between policy in Montpelier and reality on the ground that I am running to close. The state does not need to wait years to say 'yes' to safe schools, and I am ready to help finish the job," he said.

Both Superintendent Sousa and Board Chair Keri Bristow have pointed out that the State has provided emergency funding in the past to other school districts struggling with failing infrastructures. Bristow cited the rescue by the State of Vermont of the Burlington High School rebuild project in November 2022. She also noted that the AOE and its Secretary have so far left completely unaddressed the urgent and undeniable health and safety issues involved, since the existing school building continues to deteriorate despite millions of dollars invested in temporary repairs.

The conundrum, said Bristow, is especially vexing because approval of the rebuild would not obligate the State financially, predetermine future rulemaking, or guarantee future funding. It would simply recognize that the project satisfies the statutory requirements, preserve the Legislature’s authority over appropriations, and allow the district to continue advancing one of Vermont’s most thoroughly planned regional school projects while the State completes implementation of the new program.

“The State and its Agency of Education are insisting on their power to turn a deaf ear to a situation of growing emergency in one of the finest school systems in Vermont,” said Superintendent Sousa. “Once again, when we’ve urgently asked them to show up for the emergency needs of our kids, they’ve declined to be involved.”

About Mountain Views Supervisory Union (MVSU): Located in Central Vermont’s Green Mountains, MVSU serves students from Barnard, Bridgewater, Killington, Pittsfield, Plymouth, Pomfret, Reading, Woodstock, and other neighboring school-choice communities. For more information, please visit the MVSU Website. 

Contact:
Gina McAllister
MVSU Communications Committee Chair
gina.mcallister@mtnviews.org
Mobile: (802) 738-6414
Office: (802) 738-6414