Taxpayers approved the majority of warrant articles on ConVal’s ballot this year, including a controversial teachers contract.
A school board negotiating committee and members of the ConVal Education Administration, which represents employees across the district, met 12 times throughout the year to hammer out employee contracts, but the two parties eventually reached an impasse. A third-party factfinder heard arguments from both sides and made recommendations regarding each point.
The factfinder’s recommendations were accepted by the union and unanimously rejected by the school board. The decision left taxpayers to decide its fate.
Voters passed the report in a 1,590 to 1,347 vote, or 54 percent.
“Our campaign was all about investing in our community, and I firmly believe the taxpayers were on board with that message,” said Gregory Leonard, CVEA co-chair. “ … Accepting the factfinder’s report was a step toward that. It’s an investment in the community.”
Lori Groleau, CVEA co-chair, said their strong campaign push probably tipped the scales in their favor. She said the group sent out thousands of flyers, postcards and made many phone calls.
The district estimated that the factfinding report would come with a $1.685 million price tag, a number the school board agreed was too large.
Rich Cahoon, vice-chair of the school board and a member of the negotiating team, said he’s concerned about how much the factfinding report will push up the district’s budget in subsequent years.
“That’s going to place our baseline budget going into next year to over $47 million,” Cahoon said.
The board hasn’t seen a baseline budget increase by that much in one year in recent memory. He said a number of years ago, the budget jumped by about $700,000. That year, taxpayers didn’t approve the proposed budget and the district had to work with a default budget.
“How we are going to get the budget passed in subsequent years is a definite concern,” Cahoon said of the results.
Ruth Wilson, who lives at RiverMead in Peterborough, said she voted to accept the factfinder’s report.
“I voted for the teachers to get their pay against the recommendation of the board because I don’t think that the teachers should pay for supporting all these little schools all over the place,” Wilson said while waiting for a bus to take her back to RiverMead after voting on Tuesday.
Madeline Garland, a senior at ConVal, voted for the first time ever on Tuesday. She turned 18 in August.
Garland said she’s on student council and through that position has been paying close attention to the warrants on the ballot this year. She said she one of the items she was particularly interested in was the teacher contracts. She voted “yes” to accept the factfinder’s report.
“My mom’s a teacher,” Garland said. “And I feel like teachers should be the highest paid people in the community.”
Others said they went with the recommendation from the school board.
“I sort of went with the school board recommendation so I voted ‘no,’” Margot Graham, who recently moved to Peterborough from Hancock, said about Article 3 after she had voted. “… I did sort of follow their recommendations I have to confess. But I feel like they have a lot more discussion about it and a lot more information about it.”
A petitioned warrant article that would have given the school board authority to shutter schools in the event that student-body population dipped below 50 students for two consecutive years failed.
Article 10 was defeated in a 1,345 to 1,586 vote.
The article needed about 66 percent to pass but only picked up 46 percent.
The item stirred a lot of discussion within the community at various meetings this year.
“An elementary school is an important part of the town,” Graham said, adding that her kids attended elementary school in Hancock, where she believes they received a good education.
Others argue keeping each of the elementary schools is too expensive.
“We got to think about consolidation,” said Ron Lucas, a voter in Greenfield, pointing to costs as the main reason.
Cahoon said the district is in the midst of studying possible reconfiguration/ consolidation options. Those findings could appear on the ballot next March.
Taxpayers passed ConVal’s proposed $45.58 million operating budget.
The budget was approved by 65 percent, with 1,922 people voting “yes” on the item and 1,016 voting “no.”
Cahoon said the percentage was higher than the district has seen in a long time.
An article for a $1 million bond for renovations to two of the high school science labs passed.
The item needed a 60 percent majority and sailed through with 70 percent.
Approval of the article means two science classrooms will be renovated at the same time as two chemistry labs, which has already been approved by the school board. Construction on the four labs is slated to begin this summer. Cahoon said completing all of the rooms at once will end up saving the district about $75,000.
Garland said she voted yes to renovate the science labs, in part, because if the project didn’t go through the school was also in danger of losing accreditation.
“That’s a pretty big deal,” Garland said. “Especially for kids who are looking to go to college. Colleges won’t take your application as seriously if your school isn’t accredited.”