The Onteora school board on Oct. 14 settled on a scaled-back capital plan costing $41.9 million, far less than the $70.5 million proposal defeated in May, and plans to formally vote Oct. 21 to schedule a Dec. 10 referendum.
Proposition 1, to be covered by a $26.9 million bond, will include eight new classrooms, an art room, an expanded library, office space, a security vestibule, and new bathrooms at Bennett Elementary to accommodate a central campus.
Additional Bennett improvements include a new boiler, drop-off area, playground and parking reconfiguration, front hallway renovations, drainage improvements, new electrical service, and fuel tank relocation.
A $15 million Proposition 2 will be paid for by existing capital funds and includes new Bennett windows, relocating Bennett music rooms, ceiling and light replacement, three new high school science classrooms, a new high school nurse’s suite, and improvements to high school athletic fields.
The grade structure in a future district with only one elementary school will be determined by whether this second capital project passes or fails.
If Proposition 1 passes, which includes the bulk of the Bennett expansion, Bennett will serve grades K-5, the middle school will serve grades 6-8, and the high school will serve grades 9-12.
If Proposition 1 fails, Bennett will house grades K-4, the middle school will serve grades 5-8, and the high school will serve grades 9-12.
The voter referendums for Propositions 1 and 2 do not mention the plan to close Woodstock Elementary. That will be addressed in a board resolution, which some trustees, including Caroline Jerome, believe is a distraction.
A resolution in May 2023 called for a unified campus by 2028, and while not specifically mentioning Woodstock, it would have necessitated the school’s closure. Many voters believed defeating the voter proposition for improvements to Bennett would prevent closing Woodstock, but that decision is up to the board.
“I think that everybody is really beginning to grasp this idea that fifth grade, without these bonds passing, could be absorbed into the middle school. Nobody’s happy about that,” trustee Caroline Jerome said.
“Somebody has to tell me why this [resolution] is important right now when we’re trying to put together two propositions for a vote on Dec. 10. That, to me, should be the main focus.”
Vice president Rick Knudsen believes the reason for the May defeat is the sources of information. While the school board meetings are livestreamed on YouTube and archived for watching later, very few people view them, he noted.
“The unfortunate but inescapable reality is that when we had our proposition in May, very many people in this district got their information not from us, but from road signs, billboards, banners, other sources that confused the message, confused what was going on, and we’ve been getting emails this week just misunderstanding what was on the ballot in May,” he said.
“And so to me that aspirational aspect to the ’23 resolution is what opened the door to people being confused about what they were voting for.”
Trustee Clark Goodrich doesn’t want a resolution that backs the district into a corner.
“I think what scared me about the resolution is I felt that if we don’t get this proposition 1 passed in December, then we’re locked into having to put the fifth grade into the middle school without … giving the administration enough runway to actually come up with a plan and make sure it’s going to be a good plan.”
Superintendent Victoria McLaren clarified the district won’t submit the consolidation plan to the state Department of Education until March 2028, so there is time to make changes.
“For me, the resolution clarifies for the voters that we as a board agree that we are moving forward to a central campus by September 2028, that it doesn’t put the onus of this decision on the voters. It puts the onus of this decision on the board,” president Cindy Bishop said.
“We faced a very strong and moneyed opposition in May, and they have spoken quite clearly, I think, to us at least at our Sept. 30 meeting that they will vote no on any proposition that we put up that has an addition to Bennett that includes Woodstock K-5 students,” she said.
“I feel like if we wait and see whether they’re really going to vote no on a proposition that would really impact all the K-5 students in the district—even theirs—that means that we have to wait another year to put up a bond and consider a capital project. And that is a year that we may lose significant funding and end up having to move Woodstock K-5 students to Boiceville without any improvements.”
The board will continue to discuss and make changes to the resolution calling for a central campus and include specific language explaining grade configuration.
Voters may need to travel to Boiceville
The school board plans to vote on a resolution Oct. 21 to hold all voting Dec. 10 at the high school wrestling room.
Superintendent Victoria McLaren said the single polling place, which will only be for the Dec. 10 vote, will allow expanded voting hours from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. and is ADA compliant. She said it is “only in one place, centrally located, but with greatly expanded hours and very accessible.”
However, some critics of the consolidation plan have criticized the proposed move as voter suppression, especially since the majority of “no” votes in May came from Woodstock-area voters.
McLaren said there is nothing nefarious about the change in polling places.
“We believe that this building is accessible for the entire district, and this configuration allows for expanded voting hours without interruption of the instructional space,” she said.
Addressing transportation concerns, McLaren said early voting by mail is available and that all the information on how to obtain a mail-in ballot will be on the district website, onteora.k12.ny.us.
“We are not attempting voter suppression in any way,” she said.
Dec. 10 is a superintendent’s conference day. When asked about the need to separate the voting from the instructional area, she said teachers and staff will still be in the buildings.
“Holding voting in a separate space is still preferable. This space is adjacent to Central Administration and has an entrance and exit that are not part of the main instructional space within the building,” she said.
McLaren pointed to safety issues posed by the lack of daylight in December as a reason.
“Also, we are used to school votes happening in late May, approaching the summer solstice. On Dec. 10 the sun will set in Woodstock at 4:24 p.m., the earliest sunset of the year. Were we to hold voting at Woodstock Elementary from 2 to 9, the majority of the voting hours would be in the dark. Many seniors are uncomfortable driving in the dark,” she said.
“When we hold voting at Woodstock Elementary, more often than not, because parking is limited, many voters end up parking on the side of the road across Route 375 and have to cross Route 375 on foot. Voters having to do so in the dark would create a safety hazard,” she said.
“By expanding the hours from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m., we increase the daylight hours available to vote from 2.5 to 3 hours to over 9 hours.”
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