Norwich — A new school building committee was established this week, but city officials cannot yet say when or how the group will start working to plan for a major building consolidation and renovation project.

The project, deemed a top priority to evaluate, renovate or close some of the city’s 15 aging and costly school buildings, would have to be put to voters in a referendum in a year or two. The new committee is not expected to meet until May, and officials are unsure whether the initial meetings will be in person or by telephone, given the ongoing concerns about the COVID-19 virus and the closure of City Hall.

City Council President Pro Tempore Mark Bettencourt, a member of the council’s Appointments/Reappointments Committee, said he was pleased with the quality of applicants, especially with the number of new people who have volunteered for the committee.

“We have a lot of new blood,” he said. “It’s nice to see a group that’s not the same old faces. I’m please. The thing that stood out was we had such a good quality group of candidates.”

The council voted unanimously Monday to appoint: Norwich Public Schools teacher Gregory Ballassi; former Alderman Gerald Martin, a master electrician; Sprague school Superintendent William Hull; community member Peter Gauthier and retired U.S. Coast Guard civil engineer Gregory Carabine.

Additionally, City Council members Bettencourt, Derell Wilson and Stacy Gould, Board of Education Chairwoman Heather Romanski and board member Christine Distasio and City Manager John Salomone were appointed as ex-officio members.

The council expects to appoint one more Norwich teacher, as one candidate withdrew from consideration.

Hull said he has lived in Norwich for most of his life and said the school buildings were “tired” years ago when his two children attended.

“I just wanted to give something back,” he said. “I live in Norwich. My kids grew up here. This is important to me.”

In his more than 30 years as in education in various eastern Connecticut districts, Hull has served as an ex-officio member of school building committees and served in districts when major renovation projects were underway.

Hull served as a teacher in Salem for 17 years, was dean of students and middle school assistant principal in the Lyme-Old Lyme school district for three years and was a principal and assistant superintendent in Montville during a major renovation project for all school buildings. He was superintendent in Putnam for 10 years, including a time when Putnam High School underwent a $36.5 million renovation, he said.

Hull started in Sprague in August as a part-time superintendent. He doubled as an interim principal for a time at the start of the school year.

The new school building committee will start with the report and recommendations of the School Facilities Review Committee, which approved a plan last summer that was a modification of a plan rejected by the City Council in May 2017.

The plan calls for renovating as new the John B. Stanton, John Moriarty and Uncas elementary schools and building a fourth new elementary school, all to house preschool through fifth-grade students. The proposed new school building would accommodate 300 to 600 students, preferably in a Greeneville, Laurel Hill or East Side neighborhood.

The Teachers’ Memorial Middle School would be renovated as new for grades six through eight, as would the recently renovated Kelly Middle School.

The two current preschool centers, the Bishop School and Deborah Tenant-Zinewicz School, would be closed and listed for sale. Bishop also houses several school offices and technical departments. Those would move to Samuel Huntington School, which would close as an elementary school and house administrative offices and the Norwich Transition Academy, a vocational program for special education students aged 18 to 21.

The Thomas Mahan Elementary School, located in a prime commercial area off Route 82, would be closed and listed for sale.

The central office building, the historic 1895 former John Mason School at the Norwichtown Green, also would be closed and listed for sale. The Hickory Street School, which houses the Norwich Transition Academy, also would be listed for sale.

c.bessette@theday.com