Voters unanimously OK MDI school plan

Voters in each Mount Desert Island town that had been considering participating in a new reorganized school administration entity to replace School Union 98 approved the plan on Tuesday.

The proposal, which has been approved by the state Department of Education, passed by large margins in Bar Harbor, Cranberry Isles, Frenchboro, Mount Desert, Southwest Harbor, Swan’s Island, Tremont and Trenton. All those towns currently are members of Union 98 except Trenton, which now is a member of neighboring Union 92.

The closest vote was in Swan’s Island, which still approved the measure by a 153-75 vote. The overall tally for the eight towns was 5,676 in favor and 1,629 opposed.

The new school administration organizational structure, which has yet to be formally named, is expected to go into effect on July 1, 2009. A new governing board for the arrangement will be formed sooner than that so a 2009-10 district budget can be drafted and approved before next July, according to Union 98 Superintendent Rob Liebow.

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