To the Editor:
With all the numbers being casually tossed around about how much money each town in RSU 12 pays, let’s look at what the Superintendent and the Chairman of the Finance Committee of RSU 12 have used in past presentations, along with statistics from the State Planning office.
It is clear that Wiscasset had 24 percent of the students last year and paid a current cost of 35 percent. This is straight from an RSU presentation that showed the effect of going to an equal cost per student allocation.
In this scenario, Wiscasset would save $1.4 million. This is the only fair way to transition like most successful school systems have done or are now doing. Can you imagine going into any store and having the price you pay be based on where you live?
Since we are one school system and the high school benefits everyone by letting the other towns continue to tuition out their students (a high school is required in every RSU and this is why RSU 12 is fighting to keep Wiscasset) then everyone should pay the same to educate their children just like every private school, college and University does.
The newest tactic by the current Board Chair of the RSU is to say Wiscasset pays only 23 percent. That’s not true. We pay 22 percent of the school allocation, but we pay 33 percent of the local contribution.
As has been said, numbers can mean anything that people want them to mean. In this case, these numbers came straight from the RSU and show that Wiscasset paid 35 percent with 24 percent of the students. Take this year’s budget and we pay 33 percent with a student enrollment that has now shrunk to 23 percent with only 32 students graduating from the high school in 2012.
It is clear that RSU 12 is not working educationally or financially for the students and taxpayers of Wiscasset.
Doug Smith, Chairman of WERP, Wiscasset
