The Jefferson Budget Committee announced a new principal, voted on recommendations for the new school project and reviewed a proposed $4.3 million school budget during a special meeting Wednesday night.
After being confirmed as the new Jefferson Village School principal, Peter Gallace brought forth an action plan for the upcoming school year. Gallace has acted as the school’s assistant principal and has been teaching grades 1, 3 and 4 at the school.
“I’m very excited,” Gallace said of his new position. “I think there will be a lot of important decisions to make.”
Gallace and others look to the future in consideration of a new school building for the town. Residents learned during an April 14 school meeting the state has approved the concept design for the state funded new school building project.
Optional features not covered by state funding and to be paid for by the town include additional space for the cafeteria, library and gymnasium, a pitched roof (as opposed to a flat roof), a geothermal heating system and an emergency generator.
The June 9 referendum ballot will have recommendations from the Budget Committee and Board of Selectmen regarding the project and the additional features.
There will be a hearing on the project May 18 at JVS, where residents will learn about the costs and features of the project. Architects from Oak Point architectural firm will join Building Committee members to review the concept design for residents and to answer any questions people have.
Residents will vote twice on the Jefferson school budget: once on May 27 and again on June 9.
As the proposed budget indicates, state funding is $244,872 less than the allocated funding for the current year.
“We’re up in valuation and down in student population,” School Union 132 superintendent Frank Boynton said as the reason for a drop in state funding. “That’s the worst case scenario.”
The proposed budget also shows a $576,479 increase in the local share, up 21.26 percent from local funding that went to support the current budget.
The Budget Committee has yet to make their recommendations on the proposed budget.
There will also be a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ vote question on June 9 for the Alternative Organizational Structure (AOS) budget.
Jefferson joined Union 74 to form the AOS, formerly called, the Central Lincoln County School System, the plan for which was approved by Dept. of Education and officially starts operating as such a system on July 1.
