While most of the ballot, including a $13.9 million budget, sailed through voting, the town balked at a study of the impacts of the withdrawal of one or more member towns of the ConVal School District.
The study, which was a warrant article brought by petition and supported by the Select Board and Budget Committee, was the most contentious vote of the day Tuesday. Residents ultimately said “no” to the study in a 328 yes, 376 no vote.
A separate article, which was not brought by petition, would have allocated $20,000 to use contracted services to review the study. That also failed, though again, the vote was split, with 314 voting yes and 391 voting no.
“This vote is part of a process, and the vote was close,” wrote Nadia MacStay, one of the members of the Concerned Citizens Committee, which sponsored the petition, in an email to the Ledger-Transcript on Wednesday. “There are many people who have long felt frustrated by the inability of the district to address and arrive at conclusions to some very serious problems. I am hoping that this petition article brought forward some of these issues, and that in the future residents will be more aware of where the district is or is not going.”
Select Board member Barbara Miller, who was re-elected at the polls on Tuesday, also saw the close vote as an eye-opener for the district.
“I think that the good thing that comes out of this is that people are expressing a concern, and they see now that there’s a need to take a hard look at the district and where it’s going,” said Miller in an interview Wednesday. Though the Select Board voted to support the petition, Miller said she was not in support of Peterborough withdrawing from the school district, but that she would like to see an “in-depth look at the school system and where we’re going.”
“I’m ecstatic that it failed,” said Linda Quintanilha, the Bennington representative to the ConVal School Board.
Quintanilha was not concerned that the vote was close.
“I think there’s two parts,” said Quintanilha. “One, our role as citizens starts with our vote. And the turnout being so low is troubling. Second, our role as citizens only starts with that vote. We must hold all of our elected officials accountable for moving education in the right direction and making sure that our students all have opportunity is a critical role in citizenship.”
Some members of the School Board who did not support the articles said that the district’s strategic plan would address some of the same questions that the study would have, though those aspects would not start to be discussed for at least another two years.
“I’m happy that they turned it down for now,” said David Martz, the Temple representative to the School Board. “We’re going to continue our work of the study of the district through our strategic plan.”
“We are gratified that [Peterborough] will continue the partnership,” said Rich Cahoon, one of the Antrim representatives on the school board. Cahoon and Crista Salamy were in preliminary talks with John Stark High School and had a meeting planned for next week. Cahoon said they would most likely cancel the meeting.
Other warrant items on the ballot passed handily. The budget – $13.9 million, including general government, water and wastewater – passing overwhelmingly 582-102.
Numbers were similar for the other two articles on the ballot. A request for $43,113 to be placed in the Financial Management Software and Hardware Capital reserve – with $18,152 coming from water and sewer funds – passed 581-102.
A $5,000 addition to the Geographic Information System Capital Reserve, for the purpose of upgrading and maintaining aerial maps and planimetric data, passed 564-115.
Town Meeting was held Wednesday night in the Town House. For results, visit www.ledgertranscript.com or see Tuesday’s edition of the Ledger-Transcript.
Ashley Saari can be reached at 924-7172 ext. 244. She’s on Twitter @AshleySaariMLT.