Residents of Brattleboro, Guilford, Putney, and Dummerston should be on the alert. A vote coming up on Tuesday, Nov. 7 concerns merging all of our schools under the supervision of a nine-member board and the administration.
All of the present school districts will lose their locally elected school boards, the opportunity to present and discuss their separate budgets at local town meetings, control over teachers and where they teach, and - most of all - ownership of their school buildings and grounds, property that they have worked so hard to build and maintain. The buildings and grounds will belong to and be controlled by the Super District, if this merger passes, not the individual towns. The above are only a few things local towns will lose.
Brattleboro: Your taxes will go up! Right now, Brattleboro has the lowest education homestead tax rate at 1.5976 per $100 assessed value. Brattleboro's municipal tax rate is by far the highest of the other communities. If the merger passes, your education homestead tax rate would most likely go up, as Brattleboro would then be partly responsible for their share of any of the outlying towns' debt, any deferred maintenance, and any additional programs to create “equity” in all towns.
Guilford, Putney, and Dummerston: The most important issue for your towns is that your respective schools could be closed without a vote of your town. This is according to the articles of agreement that the Study Committee has drawn up over the objections of members of the outlying towns. It has already been said several times that Brattleboro could absorb all of Guilford's students without adding any teachers.
Congratulations to the 2016 graduated eighth-grade class of Dummerston. They were number one in the state in both English and math in the Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium tests last year. And kudos to the Dummerston teachers who have taught these students over their elementary years in town. They are...
Wow! So many news articles recently, all slanted by administration and top state officials. There are a lot of other views to this school merging issue, but unfortunately citizens do not have the same clout. There are so many issues with these articles that I can't begin to address...
I have attended study committee meetings since the beginning. The Act 46 Study Committee voted to accept the Articles of Agreement and to send them to the state Board of Education. The committee had scheduled an all-towns vote on Nov. 8, but they have since decided to postpone it to next year. I am upset about the comments that Dummerston's voting member made to the study committee. She said that the Dummerston residents are “stuck on adult issues” rather than...
I am excited this year to vote for someone I truly believe is the best candidate for the job instead of closing my eyes and picking a candidate. I am voting for Kesha Ram as our next lieutenant governor, and I am urging everyone I know to vote for her as well. Kesha impressed me the first time I met her, and I have talked with her many times since. She even came to my house to meet with a...
Act 46 has many unintended consequences. At least I hope they are unintended. One most unfortunate consequence is the potential breakup of very-well-operating supervisory unions that have been working well together for many years to serve all of their students. This is happening all over the state, but I am mostly aware of two in our area: Windham Southeast Supervisory Union (WSESU) and Windham Central Supervisory Union (WCSU). WSESU has been in the 706b study committee mode since last November.
Thanks to Jerry Goldberg for a terrific uplifting interview. It is great to finally read something positive about our area after all the negativity. I am so glad to have Luke in our community with his wonderful positive attitude and feeling for the area, for bringing a great business to town, and for adding so many young people to the mix. I hope we can bring in a lot more bright and creative younger people to town. Thanks, Jerry and...