Class notes from BOE meeting of 1/10/2012, courtesy of Howard Simon

Howard Simon, Thank you for writing up this meeting summary!!


While the meeting featured presentations about the Middle School and Elementary School programs, what probably was the most important news of the night came at the end of the three-hour meeting, long after most in the audience had left. Specifically, there was what seemed a very public sign of what the teachers union thinks about the possibility of making contract concessions.

After a parent told the Board he felt like he was living through “Groundhog Day” because the teachers didn’t give anything in the way of concessions last year and aren’t giving anything this year, Christine Vasilev, president of the Port Washington Teachers Association, demanded a chance to respond. Although acknowledging Vasilev, who began shouting after the Board said it was about to close the public comments portion of the meeting, was out of order, the Board allowed her a chance to speak. She argued that the teachers have worked and are continuing to work with the district to find solutions to the budget problem, and that people should stop talking about cutting costs and focus instead on raising revenue – in other words, collect more taxes. Vasilev did not say school taxes should go up, only that the community should work together to close the tax loopholes currently enjoyed by corporations. The bottom line seems clear: the PWTA does not look favorably on the calls from parents and others in the district for contract concessions and is showing no sign that it will respond positively to such calls.

Another piece of potentially important news came at the start of the evening, when the president of the Port Washington Educational Assembly, a group which has mobilized voters against the school budget for several years, told the Board that for the “first time in years” his organization is prepared to tell its members to support the budget provided that the budget came in UNDER the tax cap. Signs are the Board will do just that, thus requiring deep cuts to be made, but there is a caveat from the PWEA: it would like the costs associated with a planned bond issue (needed to repair the roof at the Weber Middle School) to be factored in as well. What that seems to mean is that if district taxpayers approve the bond issue and agree to pay X a year to cover costs of the bond, then the PWEA wants a savings equal to X included in the budget. It’s not clear how this is going to play out – further, the Board itself is publicly divided over whether the bond vote should take place on the same day as the budget vote.

As far as the presentations themselves (which should be visible on the district website soon if not already), they contained few surprises. Basically, the middle school says it is doing very little which isn’t mandated so any cuts will be devastating, and the elementary schools say they already bore the brunt of the sacrifice last year (fewer librarians and guidance counselors) and hope not to be hurt more. As for the specific issue of possibly cutting kindergarten to a half-day program, the principals said they would “rather look at other options” and that they would “prefer to look for other ways to economize” if it meant they could get back some librarians and guidance counselors. However, they acknowledged they have no answer – yet – as to what the other options and ways might be. Again, it should be noted that full-day kindergarten is not a mandated program, and it seems evident the Board is focusing first and foremost on non-mandated programs as targets for cuts.

The next Board meeting – at which we can expect a budget discussion with details about what the Board and/or administration is thinking about cutting – is slated for January 24^th at 8 PM at Schreiber High School.