By Jennifer Boenig
Tri-town voters will be heading back to the polls in January to cast their votes for the new regional school unit board members. On Wednesday, Nov. 12, the regional planning committee’s transition team met to discuss two main issues- electing a new regional school unit board and developing a budget for the 2009 to 2010 school year.
Dennis Duquette, Union 29 superintendent, gave the transition committee members an update on the state rules for appointing an interim secretary. Duquette said he believed the secretary’s primary learned from the Department of Education that the interim secretary was required to be a certified superintendent.
“Why spend more money when we really don’t have to?” said Duquette, who agreed he would be the interim secretary, saving the committee and three towns from paying a retired superintendent to fill the position. Duquette also found out from the state, the position needed to be filled before the state would provide the school district with a school number. The interim secretary is scheduled to be appointed during the Thursday,
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Dec. 4 Union 29 school board meeting scheduled for 6:30 p.m. at the Minot Consolidated School.
The transition committee also discussed the election process for the RSU school board. The state has created a special set of rules governing the election and only requires a period of 45 to 60 days to complete the process. Duquette told the members once the Department of Education is notified regarding the appointed interim secretary, the towns only have 45 to 60 days to hold the new school board election.
“We want to have the new RSU school committee in place early enough so that they feel comfortable trying to put a budget together. A January vote seems to work well,” said Norm Beauparlant, a transition committee member. The committee agreed to hold elections either Tuesday, Jan. 20 or Tuesday, Jan. 27. A final election date will be determined by Duquette and the three town managers.
The new RSU school board members will work in conjunction with the current school boards on the 2009-2010 school budget process. Duquette cautioned the budget
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process will not be easy, especially after receiving state notification of a budget curtailment order.
In a memo to the state’s superintendents of schools, Department of Education Commissioner Susan Gendron stated “Governor Baldacci has charged each state agency with making recommendations for curtailments this fiscal year. The Department of Education, which accounts for nearly 40 percent of the state’s General Fund expenditures, is responsible for recommending to the Governor $54,793,297 in curtailments for the current fiscal year. These are extremely difficult economic times with very difficult choices for us in the days ahead. As I indicated recently, we are facing the probability of flat-funding, at best, for the next two-year budget, beginning July 1, 2009.”
Duquette suggested having school committee members break out into smaller subcommittees focusing on specific departments to help find additional efficiencies and cost-saving measures. “In a nutshell, the central office and the administrators and principals are really going to put the budget together. I think our hard job as the transition committee and new
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school committee is to be looking at the difficult decisions,” said Duquette. The 2009-2010 school budget will be voted on by all three towns with a referendum vote and the budget needs to pass with a majority vote across the three towns. Rick Kusturin, Union 29 business manager, offered some advice to those crafting the school budget.
“There are going to be a number of people who will say you promised us that our budgets, our town assessments would remain flat and I again, implore everybody who’s on those committees to remember that and don’t break that promise, no matter how painful it has to be. We will not start off on a good foot by breaking that promise,” said Kusturin.
Jack Wiseman suggested having the transition committee meet immediately following the Dec. 4 Union 29 meeting so the school board members could have some input on forming the budget subcommittees. Chairwoman Colleen Quint agreed and said the transition committee would meet after the Union 29 meeting to conduct any final business.
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