Norwich — The School Facilities Review Committee is not yet ready to recommend a specific school restructuring plan, but the committee will ask the City Council next week to allow the group to submit forms to seek state reimbursement and to place the item on the Nov. 8 ballot for referendum.

The committee has reduced its preferences to two options — a single-campus school complex for preschool through sixth grade and a plan that calls for major renovations to four existing schools, two for preschool to second grade and two for grades three through six.

Both options would keep the recently renovated Kelly Middle School for seventh and eighth grade.

No cost estimates are available yet for the two options.

The committee met behind closed doors on Tuesday to discuss issues involving possible property acquisition, available properties large enough to support a giant school campus and which existing city schools could be marketed for development, Chairman Dennis Slopak said.

No decisions were made on properties or which schools should be retained if the committee decides to renovate four existing schools.

“Nothing was decided, but we're coming to the point where we have to make a decision,” Slopak said.

The committee did decide to ask the City Council at its June 6 meeting to pass a resolution to submit an application to the state for reimbursement of new construction or the so-called renovate-as-new plan.

The state Department of Education and the legislature would have to approve the funding request at the next legislative session if a project is approved at the Norwich referendum.

The review committee will meet at 5:30 p.m. June 6 prior to the 7:30 p.m. City Council meeting that night.

Slopak said if the committee does decide to go with the multiple campus plan, it also would have to decide which four schools to keep.

City officials have long expressed the desire to market the Thomas Mahan School for possible development, but that school also could be expanded.

The school is located off Interstate 395 on the busy Route 82 commercial strip. A new Starbucks was built in front of the school entrance a few years ago.

The committee also could consider expanding the John Moriarty Elementary School — now an environmental sciences magnet school on Lawler Lane.

The John B. Stanton School on New London Turnpike also has land for expansion, although the property slopes down to wetlands behind the school.

Slopak said the East Great Plain Volunteer Fire Department has expressed interest in the Stanton School property if the school vacates that property.

The fire station is located at the corner of Route 82 and New London Turnpike, also in a spot that could be marketed for development, Slopak said.

The school system now has 15 occupied buildings, including the administration building in the historic former Mason School on the Norwichtown Green.

The review committee was established last fall in an effort to find long-term operational savings by downsizing the school system.

“We have to take a look at what would work out best for the city side, as well as the school side,” Slopak said.

c.bessette@theday.com