November 12, 2024
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Consolidation survey gets scant responses Candidates weighed in on repealing law

STONINGTON – A survey asking legislative candidates whether they would vote to repeal Maine’s school consolidation law garnered only a small number of respondents, but most of those supported the repeal.

Just 54 candidates of the 375 who were sent surveys responded, according to Lawrence “Skip” Greenlaw, chairman of the Coalition to Save Schools. Of those 54, 47 said they would support repeal. Six candidates said they were undecided, and just one indicated he would not vote to repeal the law.

The coalition, which mounted a petition drive to repeal the law, released the survey results this week.

“I don’t think it indicates a great deal; the sample’s so small,” Greenlaw said Wednesday. “We do know that a lot of people who did not answer [the survey] have said that they will support repeal. We’ve also spoken to a lot of people who served in the last session and opposed repeal, who have said they will support it.”

Although the response was small, the survey showed support for repeal throughout the state. Responses came from candidates in 15 of Maine’s 16 counties.

The coalition’s release also included responses from candidates that were printed in area weekly newspapers, some of which repeated responses included in the coalition’s survey. It cited The Ellsworth American, listing 24 candidates in Washington and Hancock counties. Of those, 20 said they would support repeal of the law on some level.

The Downeast Coastal Press listed nine candidates from Washington County. All said they would support repeal.

The Department of Education, which has touted the success of consolidation efforts around the state, did not appear concerned by the survey results.

DOE spokesman David Connerty-Marin stressed that the survey response was very low and suggested several reasons why, including a lack of support for repeal.

“Many of the candidates pick and choose what surveys they respond to,” he said. “It may be that they don’t answer if what they say is not going to be what the surveyor wants to hear.”

Connerty-Marin said he did not think the calls for repeal would trigger any wholesale changes in the consolidation law during the coming session of the Legislature. There may be some minor changes, he said, including one proposed by the commissioner.

Education Commissioner Susan Gendron has proposed a one-year waiver on penalties to communities who vote for a reorganization plan, but are left without partners who vote against the plan.

The coalition garnered more than 61,000 signatures on its petitions. If those are certified and repeal legislation is introduced, Connerty-Marin said, any changes to the law may be added to a referendum question as an alternative to repeal if the matter goes to the voters.

Greenlaw, meanwhile, said he hopes the Legislature will act quickly to repeal the law and suggested that next week’s election will be an indicator to legislators.

Seventeen reorganization plans that already have been approved by the commissioner will go to the voters in member communities of those proposed new districts during the Nov. 4 elections. Greenlaw has predicted that a large number of communities will reject those plans.

“My hope, if these plans are turned down, is that the Legislature and the administration will act quickly to repeal the law,” he said. “We can’t continue to drag this out.”

The law allows the commissioner to decrease subsidies to communities that fail to adopt a reorganization plan. Although the department has predicted growing support for consolidation plans in response to the current economic crisis, Greenlaw said that in the midst of a worldwide fiscal meltdown, adding financial penalties to already strapped school systems will just make a bad situation worse.

If all communities rejected the proposed reorganization plans, the penalties would total $43 million, he said. While he acknowledged that that was not likely to happen, the penalties to even half the towns would be an enormous drain on those towns at this time.

“To enforce it in these economic times, when we’re going to have cutbacks on level funding [for education] would be a terrible thing,” he said. “It would be a terrible penalty for communities to pay just because they dared to say ‘no’ to the commissioner and the governor.”

rhewitt@bangordailynews.net

667-9394

Correction: This article ran on page B3 in the State and Final editions.

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