OLD TOWN – School committees and municipal officials from Old Town, Milford, Alton, Bradley and Greenbush have been working since the beginning of the year on a plan to consolidate their schools into a single administrative unit, and on Tuesday night their proposal was rolled out for public inspection.
About 25 people attended the 7 p.m. public meeting in the Old Town High School cafeteria.
Under the terms of the plan, Regional School Unit 16, as the new entity would be named, would have a 14-member board of directors drawn from all five participating municipalities. All schools within the new unit would retain their existing names, but, with some exceptions, their property – including the land they sit on, desks and textbooks used by students, library computers and sporting equipment – would become the property of RSU 16.
“The goal is not to have ownership affect the use of the property,” said Old Town Superintendent David Walker. “No matter who owns it, the schools and the towns and the population get to use it.”
The plan also breaks down the financial obligations of the five participating communities, including debt owed on new construction and capital improvements as well as the cost of shared administrative salaries, supplies and services. The budget formula takes into account the number of students as well as the property tax valuations in each municipality.
The law requires that towns that do not have their own high school continue to have a choice in the new plan about where their students attend high school. Walker pointed out that about 80 percent of families in Alton, Greenbush, Bradley and Milford send their teens to Old Town High School, with most of the remaining 20 percent going to Orono High School, Bangor High School, John Bapst Memorial High School or Lee Academy.
Under the new plan, he said, those towns will have Old Town as “their” high school, but families will retain the option of choosing a different school, with the sending towns responsible for paying the difference in cost.
The plan was developed in response to the 2007 school consolidation legislation requiring the approximately 260 school districts, regions and units in Maine to trim to fewer than 80. Schools across the state are wrestling with the thorny assignment.
The plan for RSU 16 will likely be submitted to Susan Gendron, commissioner of the state’s Department of Education, by the end of this week or early next week. A final version of the plan must pass muster with voters from all five communities in a referendum vote in January.
Walker said the new plan should be posted on the Web site of the Old Town School District – www.otsd.org – by the end of this week.
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