As reform talks keep construction aid in limbo, schools say they need to rebuild

The Central Vermont Career Center in Barre will have a big ask for voters this November: $149 million to build a brand new, much larger facility.

As interest in the trades has grown, the school has been turning away around 200 students a year because of limited capacity, according to Jody Emerson, the tech center’s director.

“Every year that I've been here, the number of applicants to our center has increased,” she said.

The ballot item that voters across 18 towns in central Vermont will see on Nov. 4 will come with an explicit warning: There’s no state help available to defray the project’s cost, and there might never be.

“Therefore, 100% of the project shall be built at the school district’s cost without State participation,” the ballot item reads. The tech center’s early calcula