Job Corps to rent DV building

By KIMBERLY M. WEYANDT

LAKE HUNTINGTON, NY — Concerned residents filled the high school auditorium for the Sullivan West school board meeting on July 7 for the final chapter in the closing of two of the district’s elementary schools. By the end of the night a decision would be made and one building would welcome students in the fall.

Taking the oath of office was Jennifer Mann and Anna Neiman, and on the agenda was a resolution to rescind the decision to close the Narrowsburg and Delaware Valley buildings. Drafted by Shawn Bailey at the request of Mann, the resolution would authorize another vote, giving board members the opportunity to change their minds about closing the two buildings and allowing for “appropriate studies” to be done.

Board member Arthur Norden requested that the resolution be divided in two, one for each building.

“They are two different buildings with two different issues,” Norden said. A vote left him standing alone.

“I would like to have a lot more information at my disposal before I decide to close two buildings,” said board member Shawn Bailey.

“If the district would need to open the two buildings, they would need to find approximately 1.1 million dollars,” said Superintendent Alan Derry.

“It’s too late for this resolution to be passed and this decision to be reversed,” said board member Rick Lander. “We only have a certain amount of money that we have to spend and that means that our high school is going to lose curriculum, it’s going to lose staff, and everything that we’ve been fighting for. The original purpose of the merger was to increase curriculum.”

Board member Jennifer Mann said, “We can’t make a decision just to add programs without thinking about the 350 kids who might not care about the programs by the time they get to school… we should just wait one year and study it.”

“If we could have five members who would approve this resolution to keep the buildings open and who also could agree that we won’t decimate our program, then I would most certainly want to keep our buildings open and will vote for this resolution,” said board member Angela Daley, who had remained silent until then.

“The problem that has come, according to law and in our explanation, is that we have a $29,591,000 budget and we can not spend a penny more. If we keep the two buildings, it will cost 1.1 million dollars and how are we going to come up with that money?” Daley asked.

“The 1.1 million can come from any part of the budget. People who understand budgets know that 80 to 90 percent of the budget is driven by personnel costs, either directly or indirectly. To make a reduction of that size would obviously entail personnel.” Daley said, “So at $55,000 a teacher, taking the low side, if 10 teachers were let go, we’re looking at half a million.

“And the athletics budget is $400,000, so I guess maybe if we threw in all the rest of the extracurricular activities we could maybe come up with another $100,000. ”

“When you need 1.1 million dollars an interscholastic sports program can look pretty tempting,” argued parent Lisa Layman, “But I implore the board not to punish the one group who has done everything the board has asked of them in this merger, the students, by taking away a significant component of their education.”

In a tally of the votes, only Mann and Bailey voted in support of rescinding the decision to close the two buildings. For Delaware Valley it was just chapter one.

The board went into an executive session close to midnight. When the board came out they took action and voted to approve the rental of the Delaware Valley building to Job Corps for $6,000 a month plus utilities or $36,000 for six months.