School board caves in

By TOM KANE

LAKE HUNTINGTON, NY — They came in numbers with earnest appeals—parents, teachers and students. Their appeals did not fall on deaf ears.

As a result, the Sullivan West School Board at its meeting on June 3 directed administration to come back with an estimate of the cost of the four new positions in the 2004-2005 budget—an assistant principal, a technology teacher, an occupational therapist and a nurse—so that the board could consider saving some of the cut positions.

Six teachers and nine aides were cut from next year’s budget.

“For months, we worked on this budget in public meetings that hardly any of you attended,” said out-going board member Jerry Triolo, “and painfully came up with a budget that we felt the people would accept and the staff could tolerate. Because if voters had turned it down, we’d be at a worst mess than we are now.”

Some other board members didn’t agree.

“There’s always places where we can shift money,” said board member Rick Lander. “We can’t ignore these pleas.”

“I’m sympathetic for these teachers and aides but if you start reshuffling moneys around and tamper with the budget that you worked hard on, you’re going to pay for it next year or in later years,” said out going school superintendent Michael Johndrow.

“I can make any change you want,” said out going business manager Paul Nienstadt. “But you’d be saddling the new superintendent and business manager with something they didn’t create and may not want.”

For instance, the board could rescind its decision to put $1.5 million into lessening the debt service on the project over 20 years, but that would be an extreme measure that Nienstadt doesn’t recommend.

During the public comment at the start of the board meeting, many of the parents pleaded to have music teacher Kim Eschenberg remain at Delaware Valley School.

The plan was to move her to the high school, giving the death knell to her very popular choral program.

Other parents made similar pleas for other teachers and for the aides who are to be cut.

Some Narrowsburg Elementary School parents felt that Narrowsburg was getting less than the other schools.

Johndrow denied the validity of the rumor that computer teachers were being taken from the Narrowsburg early grades.

The district had to take $25,000 away from a planned playground at Narrowsburg to help pay for the storm water problem at the high school, even though the other two schools in the district got a playground.

The district is anticipating a successful mediation settlement against the project’s architects, the Hillier Group, who, the district says, is responsible for the failed drainage plan at the site.

The explanation didn’t sit well with some Narrowsburg parents.

”You’re taking away from our little kids,” a parent yelled.

“I don’t think it’s [any change in the budget] going to happen,” said school board chairman Bill Erdman.

In other board matters, after much discussion centering on graduation and whether it should be in the new gymnasium or the new auditorium, the board acceded to the desires of the seniors, who want it in the gym so that more relatives can attend.

“If it’s in the auditorium, each senior gets four tickets; if it’s in the gym, each gets nine tickets,” said high school principal Margaret Tenbus.

After hearing some board members complain that the quality of the sound in the gym is poor, the board decided on the gym.

This will be the first graduation ever for the new high school.